A  PADRE 


IN  FRANCE 


- 


"A   Padre  in  France" 

By   GEORGE   GORDON. 

SIGNING  himself  G.  A.  Birmingham, 
Canon  Hannay  has  at  various  times 
amused  and  delighted  a  world  of  readers 
with  tales  of  Spanish  Gold,  The  Major's 
Niece  and  various  Irish  types.  Now, 
having  given  hig  time  for  the  past  two 
or  three  years  as  a  chaplain  in  conva- 
lescent and  concentration  camps  behind 
the  lines,  he  recounts  his  experiences,  A 
Padre  in  France.  The  book  holds  noth- 
ing new  or  never  said  before  and  is  inter- 
esting primarily  for  what  it  tells  of 
Canon  Hannay — not  at  all  a  plain 
spoken  person,  rather  the  charming  and 
always  trying  to  be  helpful  vicar  of 
Meredithian  novels. 

"They  say,"  he  says,  "that  a  1  >.wyer 
sees  the  worst  side  of  human  naUuo.  A 
parson  probably  sees  the  best  of  it;  but 
though  I  have  been  a  parson  for  many 
years  and  seen  many  good  men  and  fine 
deeds,  I  have  seen-  nothing  more  splen- 
did, I  cannot  imagine  'anything  more 
splendid,  than  the  comradeship,  the 
brotherly  love  of  our  soldiers." 

Yet  in  his  'book  the  soldiers  gerve 
rathor  to  fill  the  .background ;  they  do  not 
dominate  the  scene.  This  has  been  a  war 
of  superlatives.  And  Canon  Hannay, 
who  rushes  to  no  extreme,  who  is  al- 
ways uncomplaining,  doing  his  little  best,  i 
unemotionally/  going;  about  his  duites, 
good  natured,  seems  a  little  faint  in  his 
praise.  "Hard  things,"  he  tells  us,  "have 
been  said  about  R.  A.  M.  C.  orderlies  and 
nurses.  Perhaps  they  have  been  deserved 


Front — "  A 
in  France. 


occasionally.  I  saw  their  work  at  close 
quarters  and  for  many  days  in  one  place, 
nowhere  else  and  not  again  there;  but 
what  I  saw  was  good."  This  seems  lit- 
tle enough  by  way  of  thanks  to  men  and 
women  who  through  long  months,  night 
and  day,  wfth  scant  equipment,  accom- 
plished the  impossible.  Thfo  wounded 
themselves  are  not  so  chary  of  words. 

Then,  too,  the  ease  with  which  his  con- 
science accommodates  itself  to  keep  silent 
before  the  massed  brutalities  of  war.  I 
expected  something  as  valiant,  as  anxious 
to  keep  straight  the  way,  as  hopeful  for 
the  dawn,  as  young  Donald  Hankey's  A 
Student  in  Arms.  I  find  the  padre  re- 
marking that  "the  best  battle  story  I 
ever  heard  from  the  lips  of  a  soldier  .  .  . 
was  a  rich  mixture  of  blasphemy  and  ob- 
scenity." And,  again  of  the  bishops, 
deans,  priests,  who  visited  the  camp  with 
other  distinguished  persons:  "Ecclesias- 
tics were  dull.  They  evidently  consid- 
ered it  bad  form  to  allude  to  religion  in 
any  way  and  they  did  not  know  much 
about  anything  else." 

There  is  very  little  about  religion  in 
Canon  Hannay's  book.  I>  looked  for 
something  concerning  the  thought  of  the 
man  about  to  go  up  into  the  battle  area, 
of  the  man  returned  from  the  front  des- 
perately wounded.  Not  a  word.  A  de- 
scription, witty  and  easy  to  read,  of 
Channel  voyages,  of  Madame  with  whom 
he  was  billeted  at  his  second  camp;  of 
M.,  a  neighboring  chaplain,  of  "leave" 
and  a  soldier's  delight  in  holidays,  of  the 
daily  round,  the  mud,  the  inconvenience, 
the  desperate  efforts  of  every  one  to  be 
of  service,  A  pleasant  tale. 


A  PADRE  IN  FRANCE 


WORKS  BY  THE  SAME  AUTHOR 

THE  MAJOR'S  NIECE 
MINNIE'S  BISHOP 
GENERAL  JOHN  REGAN 
HYACINTH 
BENEDICT  KAVANAGH 


LONDON :   HODDER  &  STOUGHTON 


CONTENTS 
CHAPTER   I 

PAOB 

THE  UTTERMOST   PART  .  .  .  .15 

CHAPTER    II 

GETTING  THERE 27 

CHAPTER   III 

A   JOURNEY   IN   THE   WAR    ZONE     .  .  .40 

CHAPTER    IV 

SETTLING   DOWN  •  •  •  •  .          52 

II 


206G21G 


12  CONTENTS 

CHAPTER   V 

MM 
KHAKI  ...         68 


CHAPTER    VI 

LEISURE   HOURS  ....         78 


CHAPTER    VII 

COMING   AND    GOING 95 


CHAPTER   VIII 

WOODBINE   HUT 115 


CHAPTER    [X 
T.s.c.  .         . 


CONTENTS  13 


CHAPTER   X 

FAOK 

THE   DAILY  ROUND        .  151 


CHAPTER    XI 

ANOTHER   JOURNEY      ...  164 


CHAPTER    XII 

MADAMZ     .  177 


CHAPTER    XIII 

THE   CON.    CAMP  194 


CHAPTER    XIV 

A    BACKWATER    .  .  214 


14  CONTENTS 


CHAPTER   XV 

PAC1H 

MY  THIRD   CAMP  ....  229 


CHAPTER    XVI 

LEAVE 245 

CHAPTER    XVII 

A   HOLIDAY 261 

CHAPTER    XVIII 

PADRES        ...  ...       275 

CHAPTER    XIX 

CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  289 


CHAPTER    I 

THE    UTTERMOST    PART 

I  HAVE  always  admired  the  sagacity  of 
Balak,  King  of  Moab,  about  whom  we  learn 
something  in  the  Book  of  Numbers.  He 
was  threatened  with  invasion  by  a  powerful 
foe  and  felt  unequal  to  offering  armed  re- 
sistance. He  invoked  the  aid  of  spiritual 
powers  by  inviting  a  prophet,  Balaam,  to 
come  and  curse  the  army  of  the  invaders. 
Balaam  suffered  himself  to  be  persuaded 
and  bribed  by  the  king.  All  kings — and 
the  statesmen  who  nowadays  regulate  the 
conduct  of  kings — understand  the  business 
of  managing  men  so  far.  Persuasion  and 
bribery  are  the  methods  of  statecraft.  But 
Balak  knew  more  than  the  elements  of  his 
trade.  He  understood  that  spiritual  forces, 
if  merely  bribed,  are  ineffective.  To  make 
a  curse  operate  there  must  be  a  certain 
amount  of  conviction  in  the  mind  of  the 
curser.  Balaam  was  not  convinced,  and 
when  he  surveyed  the  hosts  of  Israel  from 
the  top  of  a  hill  felt  himself  compelled  by 

15 


16          THE  UTTERMOST  PART 

the  spirit  within  him  to  bless  instead  of 
curse.  The  king,  discouraged  but  not  hope- 
less, took  the  prophet  to  the  top  of  another 
hill,  showed  him  a  different  view  of  the 
camp  of  Israel  and  invited  him  to  curse  the 
people  from  there. 

At  first  sight  this  seems  a  foolish  thing 
to  have  done ;  but  properly  considered  it 
appears  very  crafty.  From  the  fresh  view- 
point, Balaam  saw  not  the  whole,  but  only 
the  "  uttermost  part  "  of  the  hosts  of  Israel. 
I  suppose  he  no  longer  saw  the  first-line 
troops,  the  army  in  battle  array.  Instead 
he  saw  the  base  camps,  the  non-combatant 
followers  of  the  army,  a  great  deal  that  was 
confused  and  sordid,  very  little  that  was 
glorious  or  fine.  It  might  conceivably  have 
been  possible  for  him  to  curse  the  whole 
army  and  cast  a  blight  upon  its  enterprise, 
when  his  eyes  rested  only  on  the  camp- 
followers,  the  baggage  trains,  the  mobs  of 
cattle,  the  maimed  and  unfit  men ;  when 
the  fine  show  of  the  fighters  was  out  of  sight. 
Plainly  if  a  curse  of  any  real  value  was  to 
be  pronounced  it  must  be  by  a  prophet 
who  saw  much  that  was  execrable,  little 
that  was  obviously  glorious. 

It  is  Balak's  sagacity  in  choosing  the 
prophet's  second  point  of  view  which  I 


17 

admire.  If  any  cursing  of  an  army  is  done 
at  all,  it  will  be  done  by  some  one,  whose 
post  is  behind  the  lines,  who  has  seen,  not 
the  whole,  but  only  the  uttermost  part,  and 
that  the  least  attractive  part  of  the  hosts. 

It  was  my  luck  to  remain,  all  the  time  I 
was  in  France,  in  safe  places.  I  never  had 
the  chance  of  seeing  the  gallantry  of  the 
men  who  attack  or  the  courageous  tenacity 
of  those  who  defend.  I  missed  all  the 
excitement.  I  experienced  none  of  those 
hours  of  terror  which  I  have  heard  described, 
nor  saw  how  finely  man's  will  can  triumph 
over  terror.  I  had  no  chance  of  knowing 
that  great  comradeship  which  grows  up 
among  those  who  suffer  together.  War, 
seen  at  the  front,  is  hell.  I  hardly  ever  met 
any  one  who  doubted  that.  But  it  is  a  hell 
inhabited  not  by  devils,  but  by  heroes,  and 
human  nature  rises  to  unimaginable  heights 
when  it  is  subjected  to  the  awful  strain  of 
fighting.  It  is  no  wonder  that  those  who 
have  lived  with  our  fighting  army  are 
filled  with  admiration  for  the  men,  are 
prepared  to  bless  altogether,  not  war  which 
we  all  hate,  but  the  men  who  wage  it. 

The  case  is  very  different  behind  the 
lines.  There,  indeed,  we  see  the  seamy 
side  of  war.  There  are  the  men  who,  in 
2 


18          THE   UTTERMOST  PART 

some  way  or  other,  have  secured  and  keep 
safe  jobs,  the  embusques  whom  the  French 
newspapers  constantly  denounce.  There  are 
the  officers  who  have  failed,  proved  unfit 
for  command,  shown  themselves  lacking  in 
courage  perhaps,  and  in  mercy  have  been 
sent  down  to  some  safe  base.  There  are 
the  men  who  have  been  broken  in  spirit 
as  well  as  in  body,  who  drag  on  an  existence 
utterly  dull,  very  toilsome,  well-nigh  hope- 
less, and  are  illuminated  by  no  high  call 
for  heroic  deeds.  There  the  observer  sees 
whatever  there  is  to  be  seen  of  petty  spite 
and  jealousies,  the  manipulating  of  jobs, 
the  dodging  of  regulations,  all  that  is  most 
ignoble  in  the  soldier's  trade.  There  also 
are  the  men  with  grievances,  who,  in  their 
own  estimation,  are  fit  for  posts  quite  other 
than  those  they  hold.  Some  one  described 
war  at  the  front  as  an  affair  of  months  of 
boredom  punctuated  by  moments  of  terror. 
If  that  philosopher  had  been  stationed  at 
a  base  he  might  have  halved  his  epigram 
and  described  war  as  months  of  boredom 
unpunctuated  even  by  terror. 

Yet  even  behind  the  lines,  in  the  remotest 
places,  that  which  moves  our  admiration 
far  outshines  what  is  sordid  and  mean.  We 
still  bless,  not  war,  but  soldiers.  We  forget 


19 

the  failures  of  man  in  joyful  contemplation 
of  his  achievements. 

Here  are  the  great  hospitals,  where  suffer- 
ing men  succeed  each  other  day  after  day, 
so  that  we  seem  to  see  a  mist  of  pain  rising 
like  a  ceaseless  cloud  of  incense  smoke  for 
the  nostrils  of  the  abominable  Moloch  who 
is  the  god  of  war.  A  man,  though  long 
inured  to  such  things,  may  curse  the  Moloch, 
but  he  will  bless  the  sufferers  who  form  the 
sacrifice.  Their  patience,  their  silent  hero- 
ism, are  beyond  our  praise. 

Here  are  huge  cemeteries,  long  lines  of 
graves,  where  every  morning  some  are  laid 
to  rest,  with  reverence  indeed,  but  with 
scant  measure  of  the  ritual  pomp  with  which 
men  are  wont  to  pay  their  final  honour  to 
the  dead.  These  have  passed,  not  in  a 
moment  amid  the  roar  of  battle,  but  after 
long  bearing  of  pain,  and  lonely,  with  the 
time  for  last  farewells  but  none  greatly 
loved  to  say  them  to.  Yet,  standing  above 
the  lines  of  rude  coffins,  viewing  the  names 
and  numbers  pencilled  on  the  lids,  our  hearts 
are  lifted  up.  We  know  how  great  it  is  to 
lay  down  life  for  others.  The  final  wailing 
notes  of  the  "  Last  Post  "  speak  our  feeling  : 
"  Good  night.  Good-bye.  See  you  again, 
soon." 


20          THE   UTTERMOST  PART 

Here,  among  those  less  worthy,  are  men 
who  are  steadily  doing,  without  much  hope 
of  praise,  things  intolerably  monotonous, 
doing  them  day  after  day  for  years,  inspired 
by  what  Ruskin  calls  "  the  unvexed  instinct 
of  duty."  Often  these  are  old  men,  too 
old  for  field  command.  They  have  spent 
their  lives  in  the  army,  have  learned,  have 
worked,  have  waited  in  the  hope  that  some 
day  their  chance  would  come.  Soldiers  by 
profession  and  desire,  they  have  looked  for 
the  great  opportunity  which  the  war  they 
foresaw  would  give.  The  war  came  and 
the  opportunity ;  but  came  too  late  for 
them.  They  can  look  for  nothing  but  the 
dull  duties  of  the  base.  They  do  them, 
enduring  minor  hardships,  facing  ceaseless 
worries,  going  calmly  on,  while  the  great 
stream  of  war  on  which  they  hoped  to  float 
moves  on,  leaving  them  behind.  With  them 
are  others,  younger  men,  who  have  seen 
some  fighting,  have  been  wounded  or  broken 
in  health.  Often  they  have  struggled  hard 
to  secure  the  posts  they  hold.  They  might 
have  gone  home.  They  counted  it  a  desir- 
able thing  to  be  employed  still,  since  actual 
fighting  was  impossible,  somewhere  in  touch 
with  fighting  men. 

I  wonder  how  much  Balaam  divined  of 


THE   UTTERMOST  PART          21 

the  greatness  which,  no  doubt,  was  in  ''  the 
uttermost  part "  of  the  host  when  the  king 
showed  it  to  him.  I  suppose  he  under- 
stood something  of  it,  for  once  again,  to 
the  indignation  of  Balak,  he  blessed  instead 
of  cursing.  I  am  sure  that  any  one  who  has 
lived  long  among  the  men  at  our  bases 
will  feel  as  I  do.  that  his  pride  in  what  is 
great  there  far  outweighs  his  disappointment 
at  the  other  things  he  saw.  I  never  saw 
the  fighting  or  the  actual  front,  but  even 
if  I  had  seen  nothing  else  but  the  fighting 
I  could  scarcely  feel  greater  admiration  for 
our  officers  and  men  or  more  love  for  them. 
I  have,  of  course,  no  tales  of  adventure 
to  tell.  Perhaps  I  am  too  old  for  adven- 
turing, or  never  had  the  spirit  which  makes 
adventures  possible.  Yet  I  own  to  a  certain 
feeling  of  disappointment  when  the  doctor 
who  examined  me  in  London  told  me  with 
almost  brutal  frankness  that  he  would  not 
allow  me  to  be  sent  to  the  front.  To  France 
I  might  go,  and  even  that  permission,  I 
think,  was  a  concession.  But  in  France  I 
must  remain  in  places  where  hardship  is 
not  extreme.  Doctors  are  powerful  people 
in  the  army  and  in  certain  matters  their 
word  is  the  supreme  law.  But  fortunately 
there  are  always  other  doctors.  And  I 


22 

think  I  could  in  the  end  have  managed  to 
get  to  the  very  front,  in  spite  of  that  first 
man,  though  he  held  high  rank  and  was 
much  be-tabbed.  But  by  the  time  I  found 
out  how  to  get  round  his  prohibition  I  had 
become  so  much  interested  in  my  work 
that  I  did  not  want  to  leave  it  and  even  felt 
grateful  to  that  doctor  for  sending  me  to 
France  in  the  position  of  a  man  marked 
P.B.,  letters  which  stand  for  Permanent 
Base,  and  mean  that  their  bearer  will  not 
be  asked  to  go  where  fighting  is. 

For  one  other  thing  I  am  thankful  to 
the  doctor  who  examined  me.  He  did  not 
ask  me  to  be  vaccinated,  inoculated,  or  half- 
poisoned  in  any  other  way.  If  he  had 
demanded  such  things  of  me  before  I  held 
my  commission,  I  might  have  had  to  yield, 
and  I  should  have  disliked  the  business 
greatly.  Afterwards  I  remained  an  un- 
persecuted  heretic  and  never  underwent 
any  of  these  popular  operations.  For 
months,  I  know,  a  form  was  constantly 
filled  up  about  me  and  sent  to  the  medical 
staff  of  the  base  at  which  I  was,  stating 
the  awful  fact  that  I  had  escaped  the  safe- 
guards provided  for  me,  and  was  still  alive. 
I  used  to  expect  that  trouble  of  some  sort 
would  arise,  but  none  ever  did.  Perhaps 


THE   UTTERMOST  PART          23 

the  authorities  were  merciful  to  me  because 
I  made  no  attempt  to  propagate  my  opin- 
ions ;  which  indeed  are  scarcely  opinions. 
I  should  not  dream  of  denying  that  inocula- 
tion of  every  known  kind  is  excellent  for 
other  people,  and  ought  to  be  rigorously 
enforced  on  them.  My  only  strong  feeling 
is  that  I  should  escape. 

My  medical  examination  was  a  much 
more  rigorous  and  unpleasant  business  than 
my  interview —I  can  scarcely  call  this  an 
examination— with  my  particular  chief,  the 
Chaplain-General.  He  appeared  to  be  satis- 
fied by  previous  inquiries  that  I  was  a  fit 
and  proper  person — or  as  little  unfit  as 
could  reasonably  be  hoped — to  minister  to 
soldiers  in  France.  He  took  down  my 
answers  to  half  a  dozen  questions  on  a  sheet 
of  paper  which  somebody  afterwards  must 
have  lost,  for  I  had  to  answer  the  same 
questions  again  by  letter  after  I  got  to 
France. 

Up  to  the  point  of  my  interview  and 
examination  in  London,  the  negotiations 
with  regard  to  my  commission  as  Chaplain 
to  the  Forces  were  conducted  with  dignified 
deliberation.  My  letters  were  answered  a 
fortnight  or  so  after  they  were  received. 
There  was  no  sense  of  urgency  or  kurry. 


24          THE  UTTERMOST  PART 

We  might  have  been  corresponding  about  a 
monument  to  be  erected  at  a  remote  date 
to  some  one  still  alive  and  quite  young. 
This,  if  slightly  irritating,  gave  me  a  feeling 
of  great  confidence  in  the  Chaplains'  De- 
partment of  the  War  Office.  It  was  evi- 
dently a  body  which  worked  methodically, 
carefully,  and  with  due  consideration  of 
every  step  it  took.  Its  affairs  were  likely 
to  prove  efficiently  organised.  I  looked 
forward  to  finding  myself  part  of  a  machine 
which  ran  smoothly,  whose  every  cog  fitted 
exactly  into  the  slot  designed  for  it.  No 
part  of  the  War  Office  was  likely  at  the 
moment  to  adopt  a  German  motto ;  but  the 
Chaplains'  Department  was  plainly  inspired 
by  the  spirit  of  Goethe's  Ohne  haste,  ohne 
raste. 

I  have  heard  other  men  complain  that 
the  Department  is  dilatory,  not  merely 
deliberate,  and  that  it  is  often  impossible 
to  get  an  answer  to  a  letter  at  all.  There 
is  a  story  told  of  a  man  who  wrote  offering 
his  services  as  chaplain,  wrote  again  after 
a  decent  interval,  continued  to  write  for 
many  months,  and  finally  received,  by  way 
of  reply,  a  nice  little  tract — not  even  on 
patience,  but  on  conversion.  I  do  not  know 
whether  that  story  is  true  or  not.  No  tract 


THE   UTTERMOST  PART          25 

was  ever  sent  to  me,  and  my  letters  were 
answered — after  a  time. 

After  my  visit  to  London,  the  interview, 
and  the  examination,  the  whole  spirit  of 
the  proceedings  changed.  I  was  involved 
in  a  worse  than  American  hustle,  and  found 
myself  obliged  to  hustle  other  innocent 
people,  tailors  and  boot-makers,  in  order 
to  get  together  some  kind  of  a  kit  in  time 
for  a  start  to  be  made  at  the  shortest  possible 
notice. 

I  am  told  that  the  whole  military  machine 
works  in  this  way  in  dealing  with  individuals. 
There  is  a  long  period  of  leisurely  and  quiet 
thought — it  sometimes  appears  of  complete 
inertia.  Then  there  is  a  violent  rush,  and 
all  sorts  of  things  happen  in  a  minute.  I 
do  not  know  for  certain  whether  officers 
in  other  branches  of  the  service  suffer  in 
this  way.  My  experience  as  a  chaplain 
made  me  feel  like  a  bullet  in  a  gun.  For  a 
long  time  I  lay  passive,  and,  except  for  the 
anxiety  of  anticipation,  at  rest.  The  man 
who  held  the  weapon  was  making  up  his 
mind  to  fire.  Then,  without  any  special 
warning  to  me,  he  pulled  the  trigger,  and 
before  I  could  take  a  long  breath  I  was 
flying  through  space  to  an  unknown  destina- 
tion, without  even  the  comfort  of  knowing 


26          THE   UTTERMOST  PART 

that  I  had  been  aimed   at   any   particular 
object. 

But  my  faith  in  the  Department  was 
unshaken.  I  remembered  the  cautious  de- 
liberation of  the  earlier  proceedings,  and 
came  to  the  conclusion  that  whereas  there 
had  been  for  many  months  an  ample  supply 
of  chaplains  at  the  front,  and  a  regular  flow 
of  reinforcements  from  home,  a  sudden  and 
desperate  shortage  had  occurred — owing  to 
casualties  in  battle,  or  some  kind  of  pestilence 
-and  that  it  was  necessary  to  rush  new 
men  to  the  scene  of  action  at  the  highest 
speed.  This  explanation  seemed  to  me 
reasonable.  It  did  not  turn  out  to  be  true. 
There  was  no  particularly  urgent  demand 
for  chaplains  when  I  reached  France. 

I  am  now  inclined  to  think  that  the 
Chaplains'  Department  does  its  business  in 
this  particular  way  with  deliberate  intention. 
It  desires  first  to  produce  an  impression  of 
stability,  wisdom,  and  forethought.  It  pro- 
ceeds slowly,  and  for  long  periods  does  not 
proceed  at  all.  It  also  wishes  its  servants 
to  feel  that  it  is  vigorous,  filled  with  energy, 
and  working  at  terrifically  high  pressure. 
Then  it  does  things  with  a  rush  which  would 
put  to  shame  the  managing  directors  of  the 
New  York  Underground  Railway. 


CHAPTER  II 

GETTING   THERE 

I  MADE  my  start  from  Victoria  Station  on  a 
January  morning.  I  had  worn  His  Majesty's 
uniform  for  no  more  than  two  days,  and  was 
still  uneasily  conscious  of  my  strange  clothes. 
I  was  uncertain  about  the  proper  adjust- 
ment of  straps  and  buttons.  I  came  for  the 
first  time  in  my  life  into  touch  with  the 
army.  I,  a  man  of  over  fifty,  went  back 
with  a  leap  to  the  emotions  of  forty  years 
before.  I  was  a  new  boy  in  a  big  school. 

Others — some  who  have  had  the  experience 
and  more  who  have  not — have  described 
that  start  from  Victoria  or  Waterloo.  They 
have  said  something  about  the  pangs  of 
farewell,  though  I  cannot  imagine  how  any 
one  who  has  been  through  it  wants  to  talk 
about  that.  They  have  said  a  good  deal 
about  the  thrill  of  excitement  which  comes 
with  the  beginning  of  adventure.  They 
have  described  a  certain  awe  of  the  unknown. 
They  have  tingled  with  intense  curiosity. 

I    confess    chiefly   to   bewilderment,    the 

27 


28  GETTING  THERE 

discomfort  of  strangeness  and  an  annoying 
sense  of  my  own  extreme  insignificance.  I 
was  a  new  boy.  I  wanted  to  behave  pro- 
perly, to  do  the  right  thing,  and  I  had  no 
way  of  knowing  what  the  right  thing  was.  I 
was  absurdly  anxious  not  to  "  cheek  "  any- 
body, and  thereby  incur  the  kind  of  snubbing, 
I  scarcely  expected  the  kicks,  which  I  had 
endured  long  ago  when  I  found  myself  a 
lonely  mite  in  a  corner  of  the  cloisters  of 
my  first  school. 

I  sat,  with  my  bundle  of  papers  tucked  in 
beside  me,  in  a  corner  of  a  Pullman  car. 
Opposite  me  was  an  officer.  I  recognised, 
by  the  look  of  his  Sam  Browne  belt,  that 
he  was  an  old  boy,  that  he  had  been  there 
before. .  I  did  not  know  then,  being  wholly 
unskilled  in  pips  and  badges,  what  he  was. 
My  impression  now  is  that  he  was  an  artil- 
lery captain,  probably  returning  to  the  front 
after  leave.  It  seems  ridiculous  to  be  afraid 
to  speak  to  an  artillery  captain  ;  but  nothing 
would  have  induced  me  to  begin  a  con- 
versation with  that  man.  For  all  I  knew  he 
might  have  been  a  general,  and  it  might 
have  been  the  worst  kind  of  bad  form  for  a 
mere  padre  to  speak  to  a  general.  I  even 
thought  of  saluting  him  when  I  first  caught 
his  eye,  but  I  did  not  know  how  to  salute. 


GETTING   THERE  29 

It  was  he,  in  the  end,  who  spoke  to  me. 
We  had  reached  the  end  of  our  train  journey 
and  were  gathering  coats  and  haversacks 
from  the  racks  above  our  heads.  I  left  my 
papers — Punch  and  The  Bystander — on  the 
seat. 

"  You  ought  to  take  those  with  you," 
he  said.  "  You'll  find  lots  of  fellows  jolly 
thankful  to  get  them  over  there." 

So  I  was  going  to  a  land  where  men  could 
not  easily  come  by  Punch  and  The  By- 
stander. In  a  general  way  I  knew  that 
before  he  spoke.  I  had  heard  of  the  hard- 
ships of  war.  I  was  prepared  for  my  share 
of  them.  But  I  had  somehow  failed  to 
realise  that  it  might  be  impossible,  under 
certain  circumstances,  to  buy  Punch  if  I 
wanted  it. 

The  boat,  though  we  arrived  beside  it 
early  in  the  morning,  did  not  actually  start 
till  afternoon.  I  might  have  gone  to  an 
hotel  and  had  a  comfortable  luncheon.  I 
was  afraid  to  do  anything  of  the  sort. 
Military  discipline  is  not  a  thing  to  play 
tricks  with.  I  had  made  up  my  mind 
about  that  before  I  started,  and  in  the 
orders  given  me  for  my  journey  there  was 
not  a  word  about  luncheon.  I  went  hungry 
— foolishly,  no  doubt. 


80  GETTING  THERE 

I  heard  a  story  once  about  a  sergeant 
and  several  men  who  were  cut  off  by  the 
Germans  from  their  battalion.  They  held 
out  for  forty  hours  and  were  finally  rescued. 
It  was  found  that  they  had  not  touched 
their  iron  (emergency)  ration.  Asked  why 
they  had  gone  hungry  when  they  had  food 
in  their  pockets,  the  sergeant  replied  that 
the  eating  of  iron  rations  without  orders 
from  a  superior  officer  was  forbidden.  His 
was  a  great  devotion  to  discipline— heroic, 
though  foolish.  My  abstinence  was  merely 
foolish.  I  could  not  claim  that  I  had  any 
direct  orders  not  to  go  to  an  hotel  for  luncheon. 

While  I  waited  on  the  deck  of  the  steamer 
I  met  M.  He  was  alone  as  I  was ;  but  he 
looked  much  less  frightened  than  I  felt. 
He  was  a  padre  too ;  but  Ms  uniform  was 
not  aggressively  new.  It  seemed  to  me  that 
he  might  know  something  about  military 
life.  My  orders  were  "  to  report  to  the 
M.L.O."  when  I  landed.  I  wanted  very 
much  to  know  what  that  word  "  report  " 
meant.  I  wanted  still  more  to  know  what 
an  M.L.O.  was  and  where  a  stray  voyager 
would  be  likely  to  find  him. 

It  was  not  difficult  to  make  friends  with 
M.  It  is  never  difficult  for  one  padre  to 
make  friends  with  another.  All  that  is 


GETTING  THERE  81 

necessary  by  way  of  introduction  is  a  frank 
and  uncensored  expression  of  opinion  about 
the  Chaplains'  Department  of  the  War 
Office.  The  other  man's  soul  is  knit  to  yours 
at  once.  I  cannot  now  remember  whether 
M.  or  I  attacked  the  subject  first.  I  know 
we  agreed.  I  suppose  it  is  the  same  with 
all  branches  of  the  service.  Combatant 
officers  are,  or  used  in  those  days  to  be,  one 
in  heart  when  discussing  the  Staff.  I  never 
met  a  doctor  who  did  not  think  that  the 
medical  services  are  organised  by  congenital 
idiots.  Every  one  from  the  humblest  A.S.C. 
subaltern  to  the  haughtiest  guardsman  agrees 
that  the  War  Office  is  the  refuge  of  incom- 
petents. Padres,  perhaps,  express  them- 
selves more  freely  than  the  others.  They  are 
less  subject  to  the  penalties  which  threaten 
those  who  criticise  their  superiors.  But 
their  opinions  are  no  stronger  than  those 
of  other  people. 

Even  without  that  bond  of  common 
feeling  I  think  I  should  have  made  friends 
with  M.  No  franker,  more  straightforward, 
less  selfish  man  has  crossed  the  sea  to  France 
wearing  the  obscured  Maltese  Cross  which 
decorates  the  cap  of  the  padre.  It  was  my 
first  real  stroke  of  luck  that  I  met  M.  on 
the  deck  of  that  steamer.  As  it  turned  out 


32  GETTING  THERE 

he  knew  no  more  than  I  did  about  what  lay 
before  us.  His  previous  service  had  been 
in  England  and  he  was  going  to  France  for 
the  first  time.  An  M.L.O.  was  a  mystery 
to  him. 

But  he  was  cheerful  and  self-confident. 
His  view  was  that  an  exaggerated  importance 
might  easily  be  attached  to  military  orders. 
If  an  M.L.O.  turned  out  to  be  an  accessible 
person,  easily  recognised,  we  should  report 
to  him  and  set  our  consciences  at  ease.  If, 
on  the  other  hand,  the  authorities  chose  to 
conceal  their  M.L.O.  in  some  place  difficult 
to  find,  we  should  not  report  to  him.  No- 
thing particular  would  happen  either  way. 
So  M.  thought,  and  he  paced  the  deck  with 
so  springy  a  step  that  I  began  to  hope  he 
might  be  right. 

Our  passage  was  abominably  rough.  M., 
who  dislikes  being  sea-sick  in  public,  dis- 
appeared. I  think  what  finished  him  was 
the  sight  of  an  officer  in  a  kilt  crawling  on 
his  hands  and  knees  across  the  wet  and 
heaving  deck,  desperately  anxious  to  get  to 
the  side  of  the  ship  before  his  malady  reached 
its  crisis.  M.'s  chair  was  taken  by  a  pathetic- 
looking  V.A.D.  girl,  whose  condition  soon 
drove  me  away. 

It  is  one  of  the  mitigations  of  the  horrors 


GETTING   THERE  88 

of  this  war  that  whoever  takes  part  in  it 
is  sure  to  meet  friends  whom  he  has  lost 
sight  of  for  years,  whom  he  would  probably 
lose  sight  of  altogether  if  the  chances  of 
war  did  not  bring  unexpected  meetings. 
That  very  first  day  of  my  service  was  rich  in 
its  yield  of  old  friends. 

When  I  fled  from  the  sight  of  the  V.A.D.'s 
pale  face,  I  took  to  wandering  about  the 
decks  and  came  suddenly  on  a  man  whom 
I  had  last  seen  at  the  tiller  of  a  small  boat 
in  Clew  Bay.  I  was  beating  windward 
across  the  steep  waves  of  a  tideway.  His 
boat  was  running  free  with  her  mainsail 
boomed  out ;  and  he  waved  a  hand  to  me  as 
he  passed.  Once  again  we  met  at  sea  ;  but 
we  were  much  less  cheerful.  He  was  re- 
turning to  France  after  leave,  to  spend  the 
remainder  of  a  second  winter  in  the  trenches. 
He  gave  it  to  me  as  his  opinion  that  life  in 
the  Ypres  salient  was  abominable  beyond 
description,  and  that  no  man  could  stand 
three  winters  of  it.  I  wanted  to  ask  him 
questions  about  military  matters,  and  I  might 
have  got  some  light  and  leading  from  him 
if  I  had.  But  somehow  we  drifted  away 
from  the  subject  and  talked  about  County 
Mayo,  about  boats,  about  islands,  and  other 
pleasant  things. 
3 


34  GETTING   THERE 

M.,  recovering  rapidly  from  his  sea- sick- 
ness, proved  his  worth  the  moment  we  set 
foot  on  dry  land.  He  discovered  the  M.L.O., 
who  seemed  a  little  surprised  that  we  should 
have  taken  the  trouble  to  look  him  up.  We 
left  him,  and  M.,  still  buoyant,  found  an- 
other official  known  as  an  R.T.O.  He  is  a 
man  of  enormous  importance,  a  controller 
of  the  destinies  of  stray  details  like  our- 
selves. He  told  us  that  we  should  reach 
our  destination — perhaps  I  should  say  our 
first  objective — if  we  took  a  train  from  the 
Gare  Centrale  at  6  p.m.  We  had  a  good 
look  at  the  Gare  Centrale,  to  make  sure 
that  we  should  know  it  again. 

Then  M.  led  me  off  to  find  a  censor. 
Censors,  though  I  did  not  know  it  then,  are 
very  shy  birds  and  conceal  their  nests  with 
the  cunning  of  reed  warblers.  Hardly  any 
one  has  ever  seen  a  censor.  But  M.  found 
one,  and  we  submitted  to  his  scrutiny  letters 
which  we  had  succeeded  in  writing.  After 
that  I  insisted  on  getting  something  to  eat. 
I  had  breakfasted  at  an  unholy  hour.  I 
had  crossed  the  sea.  I  had  endured  great 
mental  strain.  I  had  tramped  the  streets 
of  an  exceedingly  muddy  town  in  a  down- 
pour of  rain.  I  felt  that  I  must  have  food 
and  if  possible,  wine.  M.  is  indifferent  to 


GETTING  THERE  35 

food  and  hardly  ever  tastes  wine.  But  he 
is  a  kind-hearted  man.  He  agreed  to  eat 
with  me,  though  I  am  sure  he  would  much 
rather  have  looked  up  another  official  or 
two,  perhaps  introduced  himself  to  the  Base 
Commandant. 

We  went  to  an  hotel,  the  largest  and  most 
imposing  in  the  town,  but,  as  I  discovered 
months  afterwards,  quite  the  worst.  There 
I  found  another  friend.  Or  rather,  another 
friend  found  me.  He  was  a  young  man  in  the 
uniform  of  the  R.A.M.C.  and  he  rushed  at 
me  from  the  far  end  of  a  large  salon.  I  am 
ashamed  to  say  that  I  neither  recognised 
him  nor  knew  his  name  when  he  told  it  to 
me.  But  there  was  no  doubt  of  his  friendly 
feelings.  He  asked  me  where  I  was  going. 
I  told  him,  "G.H.Q."  It  appeared  that 
he  had  just  come  from  G.H.Q.  in  a  motor. 
How  he  came  to  have  control  of  a  motor 
I  do  not  know.  He  was  a  very  junior 
officer,  not  on  anybody's  staff  and  totally 
unconnected  with  transport  of  any  kind. 
He  offered  us  the  car  and  said  that  we  could 
start  any  time  we  liked.  He  himself  was 
going  on  leave  and  the  car  had  to  go  back 
to  G.H.Q.  I  had  been  distinctly  told  by 
the  R.T.O.  to  go  in  a  train  and — it  was  my 
first  day  in  the  army — I  had  a  very  high 


36  GETTING  THERE 

idea  of  the  importance  of  obeying  orders. 
M.  laughed  at  me.  So  did  my  other  friend. 

"  Nobody,"  he  said,  "  cares  a  pin  how 
you  get  there,  and  it  doesn't  matter  when. 
This  week  or  next,  it's  all  the  same.  In 
fact,  if  I  were  you  I  should  take  a  couple 
of  days  off  and  see  the  country  before  I 
reported  at  G.H.Q." 

I  know  now  that  I  might  have  done  this 
and  that  no  one  would  have  been  surprised 
or  angry  if  I  had.  But  the  new-boy  feeling 
was  still  strong  on  me.  I  was  afraid.  It 
seemed  to  me  an  awful  thing  to  go  for  a 
tour  in  the  war  zone  in  a  kidnapped  motor, 
which  might  for  all  I  knew  be  a  car  specially 
set  apart  for  the  use  of  the  Commander-in- 
Chief. 

At  6  o'clock  we  started  in  that  car,  M., 
I,  and  a  total  stranger  who  emerged  from 
the  hotel  at  the  last  moment  and  sat  on 
my  valise.  There  was  also  the  driver  and 
M.'s  luggage.  M.  had  a  great  deal  of 
luggage.  We  were  horribly  cramped.  It 
rained  with  increasing  fury.  We  passed 
through  a  region  of  pallid  mud,  chalk,  I 
suppose,  which  covered  us  and  the  car 
with  a  slimy  paste.  But  I  enjoyed  the 
drive.  Sentries,  French  and  English,  chal- 
lenged us,  and  I  could  see  the  rain  glistening 


GETTING  THERE  37 

on  their  bayonets  in  the  light  of  our  lamps. 
We  rushed  through  villages  and  intensely 
gloomy  woods.  Sign-posts  shone  white  for 
an  instant  at  cross  roads  and  disappeared. 
The  wind  whipped  the  rain  against  our 
faces.  The  white  slime  utterly  dimmed 
my  spectacles,  and  I  looked  out  at  walls  of 
darkness  through  frosted  glass. 

The  stranger,  balanced  perilously  on  my 
valise,  shouted  to  me  the  news  that  G.H.Q. 
had  been  bombed  by  aeroplanes  the  day 
before.  It  was  all  that  was  wanted  to 
complete  the  sense  of  adventure.  I  could 
have  wished  for  a  bomb  or  two  which  would 
miss  us,  for  the  sight  of  a  Taube  (they  were 
Taubes,  not  Fokkers  or  Gothas,  in  those 
days)  swooping  into  sight  suddenly  through 
the  darkness  and  vanishing  again.  None 
came. 

We  took  the  advice  of  our  unknown 
travelling  companion  and  engaged  rooms 
in  the  hotel  he  recommended.  It  was  not 
at  all  a  bad  hotel.  If  we  had  had  any  sense 
or  experience,  we  should  have  dined  and 
gone  straight  to  bed.  That  was  what  M. 
wanted  to  do.  I  suffered  from  an  attack  of 
conscience,  and  insisted  that  we  ought  to 
report  ourselves  to  the  Deputy  Chaplain- 
General  t 


38  GETTING   THERE 

"  Our  orders,"  I  reminded  M.,  "  are  to 
report  on  arrival." 

We  set  out  to  look  for  the  Deputy-Chap- 
lain-General, M.  averring  that  he  had  a 
special  talent  for  finding  his  way  in  strange 
towns  at  night.  Owing  to  what  are  officially 
known  as  the  "  unhappy  divisions  "  of  the 
Christian  Church,  there  are  two  chief  chap- 
lains in  France.  One  controls  the  clergy 
of  the  Church  of  England.  The  other  drives 
a  mixed  team  of  Roman  Catholics,  Presby- 
terians, Methodists,  and  others  who  owe 
spiritual  allegiance  to  what  is  called  "  The 
United  Board."  At  that  time  both  these 
gentlemen  had  offices  in  the  same  town. 

In  spite  of  M.'s  instinct  for  locality  we 
came  on  the  wrong  one  first.  Our  chief  was 
located  in  the  most  obscure  corner.  We 
found  him  at  last,  or  rather  we  found  his 
office.  The  good  man  himself  was  probably 
in  bed.  An  orderly  invited  us  to  write  our 
names  in  block  capitals,  insisting  severely 
on  the  block  capitals,  in  a  large  book.  Then 
— he  must  have  recognised  that  we  were 
new  boys  and  gullible — he  said  that  we  ought 
to  report  ourselves  to  some  one  else  called 
the  billeting  officer. 

The  fact  that  we  were  already  provided 
with    beds    made    no    difference.     To    the 


GETTING  THERE  39 

billeting  officer  we  o -.\srht  to  go.  It  is  greatly 
to  our  credit  that  we  did.  I  followed  M. 
through  the  streets  of  that  town,  very 
narrow  streets,  very  twisty  and  very  badly 
lighted.  I  felt  as  Carruthers  did  when  Davis 
piloted  him  across  the  sand-banks  through 
the  fog  to  Memert.  It  was  11  o'clock  when 
we  found  the  billeting  officer.  He  was 
playing  bridge  and  did  not  in  the  least  want 
to  see  us,  appeared  indeed  to  think  that  our 
visit  was  unnecessary  and  troublesome.  We 
left  him  hurriedly. 

Our  hotel  seemed  a  home  when  we  got 
back  to  it.  A  friendly  subaltern  helped  us 
out  of  a  difficulty  and  increased  our  know- 
ledge of  the  French  language  by  telling  us 
that: 

44  In  this  country  when  you  want  soda 
water  you  say  *  Oh,  gas  us.'  " 

We  said  it  to  the  damsel  behind  the  bar, 
and  I  have  seldom  been  more  surprised 
than  I  was  when  she  produced  a  siphon. 
After  that  we  went  to  bed. 


CHAPTER  III 

A   JOURNEY   IN    THE    WAR  ZONE 

NEXT  morning  we  went  to  see  the  Deputy- 
Chaplain-General.  It  is  not  right  or  pos- 
sible, either  in  the  army  or  anywhere  else, 
to  plunge  straight  into  very  august  presences. 
We  introduced  ourselves  first  to  a  staff 
officer.  I  was  impressed  afresh  with  the 
way  the  war  throws  old  acquaintances 
together.  I  had  taken  that  staff  officer  out 
trout-fishing,  when  he  was  a  small  boy,  and 
he  remembered  it.  He  said  that  Irish  trout 
gave  better  sport  than  those  in  the  French 
rivers,  from  which  I  gathered  that  it  was 
sometimes  possible  to  get  a  little  fishing, 
in  between  battles  and  other  serious  things. 
He  had  also  been  a  college  friend  of  M.'s  at 
Cambridge.  He  asked  us  to  luncheon  and 
treated  us  most  hospitably.  Indeed,  I 
formed  an  impression  that  officers,  at  all 
events  staff  officers  at  G.H.Q.,  are  not 
badly  fed.  I  have  in  my  time  "  sat  at  rich 

40 


A  JOURNEY  IN  THE  WAR  ZONE    41 

men's  feasts."  That  staff  officers'  luncheon 
did  not  suffer  by  comparison.  M.  is,  as  I 
said,  indifferent  to  food,  but  even  he  was 
moved  to  admiration. 

"  If  this,"  he  said  afterwards,  "  is  war, 
the  sooner  it  comes  to  England  the  bet- 
ter." 

It  is  pleasant  to  be  treated  as  an  honoured 
guest,  and  the  friendliness  of  that  officer 
was  reassuring.  But  I  had  not  yet  done 
with  the  new-boy  feeling.  It  came  on  me 
with  full  force  when  I  was  led  into  an  inner 
office  for  an  interview  with  the  Deputy- 
Chaplain-General.  He  was  both  a  bishop 
and  a  general.  I  have  met  so  many  bishops, 
officially  and  otherwise,  that  I  am  not  in 
the  least  afraid  of  them.  Nor  do  generals 
make  me  nervous  when  I  am  not  myself 
in  uniform.  But  a  combination  of  bishop 
and  general  was  new  to  me.  I  felt  ex- 
actly as  I  did  in  1875,  when  Mr.  Water- 
field  of  Temple  Grove  tested  my  know- 
ledge of  Latin  to  see  what  class  I  was 
fit  for. 

There  was  no  real  cause  for  nervousness. 
The  Deputy-Chaplain-General,  in  spite  of 
his  double  dose  of  exalted  rank,  is  kind  and 
friendly  :  but  I  fear  I  did  not  make  any 
better  impression  on  him  than  I  did  on  my 


42     A  JOURNEY  IN  THE   WAR   ZONE 

first  head  master.  Mr.  Waterficld  put  me 
in  his  lowest  class.  The  Deputy-Chaplain- 
General  sent  me  to  the  remotest  base,  the 
town  farthest  of  any  town  in  British  occupa- 
tion from  the  actual  seat  of  war.  M., 
whose  interview  came  after  mine,  might 
perhaps  have  done  better  for  himself  if  he 
had  not  been  loyal  to  our  newly  formed 
friendship.  As  Ruth  to  Naomi  so  he  said 
to  me,  "  Where  thou  goest  I  will  go,"  and 
expressed  his  wish  to  the  Deputy-Chaplain- 
General.  This,  I  am  sure,  was  an  act  of 
self-denial  on  his  part,  for  M.  has  an  ad- 
venturous spirit.  The  Deputy  -  Chaplain- 
General  is  too  kind  and  courteous  a  man 
to  refuse  such  a  request.  It  was  settled 
that  M.  and  I  should  start  work  to- 
gether. 

We  set  forth  on  our  journey  at  4 
o'clock  that  afternoon,  having  first  gone 
through  the  necessary  business  of  inter- 
viewing the  R.T.O.  He  was  a  young  man 
of  a  most  detestable  kind.  The  R.T.O.  has 
a  bad  name  among  officers  who  travel  in 
France.  He  is  supposed  to  be  both  uncivil 
and  incompetent.  My  own  experience  is 
not  very  large,  but  I  am  disinclined  to  join 
in  the  general  condemnation.  I  have  come 
on  R.T.O. 's  who  did  not  know  their  job. 


A  JOURNEY  IN  THE  WAR  ZONE    43 

I  have  come  on  others  wearied  and  harassed 
to  the  point  at  which  coherent  thought 
ceases  to  be  possible.  I  only  met  one  who 
deliberately  tried  to  be  insolent  without 
even  the  excuse  of  knowing  the  work  he 
was  supposed  to  be  doing.  On  the  other 
hand  I  have  met  men  of  real  ability  en- 
gaged on  military  railway  work,  who  re- 
main quietly  courteous  and  helpful  even 
when  beset  by  stupid,  fussy,  and  querulous 
travellers. 

M.  and  I  struggled  into  a  train  and  imme- 
diately became  possessed  by  the  idea  that 
it  was  going  the  wrong  way,  carrying  us 
to  the  front  instead  of  the  remote  base  to 
which  we  were  bound.  I  do  not  remember 
that  we  were  in  any  way  vexed.  We  had  a 
good  store  of  provisions,  thanks  to  my 
foresight  and  determination.  We  were  in  a 
fairly  comfortable  carriage.  We  were  quite 
ready  to  make  the  best  of  things  wherever 
the  train  took  us. 

A  fellow-traveller,  a  young  officer,  offered 
us  comfort  and  advice.  He  had  a  theory 
that  trains  in  France  run  round  and  round 
in  circles,  like  the  London  Underground. 
The  traveller  has  nothing  to  do  but  sit  still 
in  order  to  reach  any  station  in  the  war 
area;  would  in  the  end  get  back  to  the 


44    A  JOURNEY  IN  THE   WAR  ZONE 

station  from  which  he  started,  if  he  sat 
still  long  enough.  M.  refused  to  believe 
this.  He  insisted  on  making  inquiries  when- 
ever the  train  stopped,  and  it  stopped 
every  ten  minutes.  His  efforts  did  not  help 
us  much.  The  porters  and  station  masters 
whom  he  hailed  did  not  understand  his 
French,  and  he  could  make  nothing  of  their 
English.  The  first  real  light  on  our  journey 
came  to  us  in  an  odd  way.  At  one  station 
our  compartment  was  suddenly  boarded  by 
three  cheerful  young  women  dressed  in  long 
overalls,  and  wearing  no  hats. 

"  Are  you,"  they  asked,  "  going  to 
B.  ?  " 

"  Not  if  we  can  help  it,"  I  said.  "  But 
we  may  be.  The  place  we  are  trying  to  go 
to  is  H." 

The  young  women  consulted  hurriedly. 

"  If  you're  going  to  H.,"  said  one,  "  you 
must  go  through  B." 

A  second,  a  more  conscientious  girl,  cor- 
rected her. 

"  At  least,"  she  said,  "  you  may  go 
through  B." 

"  I  should  think,"  said  the  third,  "  that 
through  B.  is  as  likely  a  way  as  any.  Will 
you  take  a  letter  for  us  ?  It's  most  im- 
portant and  the  post  takes  ages.  You've 


A  JOURNEY   IN  THE  WAR  ZONE    45 

only  got  to  hand  it  to  any  of  our  people 
you  see  on  the  platform  or  drop  it  in  at 
any  of  our  canteens.  It  will  be  delivered  all 
right." 

Who  "  our  people  "  or  what  "  our  can- 
teens "  might  be  I  did  not  at  that  time 
know.  It  was  our  fellow-traveller  who 
offered  to  take  the  letter. 

"  I'm  not  exactly  going  to  B.,"  he  said ; 
"  but  I  expect  I'll  fetch  up  there  sooner  or 
later." 

The  letter  was  given  to  him.  The  young 
women,  profuse  in  their  thanks,  sprang 
from  the  train  just  as  it  was  starting.  Our 
fellow-traveller  told  me  that  our  visitors 
belonged  to  the  Y.M.C.A.  I  was  not,  even 
then,  much  surprised  to  find  a  Young  Men's 
Christian  Association  run  chiefly  by  young 
women,  but  I  did  wonder  at  this  way  of 
transmitting  letters.  Afterwards  I  came  to 
realise  that  the  Y.M.C.A.  has  cast  a  net 
over  the  whole  war  area  behind  the  lines, 
and  that  its  organisation  is  remarkably 
good.  I  imagine  that  the  letter  would  have 
reached  its  destination  in  the  end  wherever 
our  fellow-traveller  happened  to  drop  it. 
I  suppose  he  took  the  same  view.  His 
responsibility  as  a  special  messenger  sat 
lightly  on  him. 


46     A  JOURNEY   IN  THE  WAR  ZONE 

" 1  may  spend  the  night  at  B.,"  he  said, 
"  or  I  may  get  into  the  Paris  express  by 
mistake.  It  is  very  easy  to  get  into  a 
wrong  train  by  mistake,  and  if  I  once 
get  to  Paris  it  will  take  me  a  couple 
of  days  to  get  away  again.  I'm  not  in 
any  kind  of  hurry,  and  I  deserve  a  little 
holiday." 

He  did.  He  had  been  in  the  trenches  for 
months  and  was  on  his  way  to  somewhere 
for  a  course  of  instruction  in  bombing,  or 
the  use  of  trench  mortars,  or  map-reading. 
In  those  days,  early  in  1916,  the  plan  was 
to  instruct  young  officers  in  the  arts  of  war 
after  they  had  practised  them,  successfully, 
for  some  time.  Things  are  much  better 
organised  now.  Trains  are  no  longer  boarded 
by  young  women  with  letters  which  they 
wish  to  smuggle  through  uncensored.  It  is 
difficult  to  get  into  the  Paris  express  by 
accident.  But  courses  of  instruction  are 
still,  I  imagine,  regarded  by  every  one, 
except  the  instructors,  as  a  way  of  restoring 
officers  who  are  beginning  to  suffer  under 
the  strain  of  life  in  a  fighting  battalion.  A 
holiday  frankly  so-called,  in  Paris  or  else- 
where, would  be  better ;  but  a  course  of 
instruction  is  more  likely  to  meet  with  the 
approval  of  a  general. 


A  JOURNEY  IN  THE  WAR  ZONE    47 

That  journey  of  ours  would  have  taken 
eight  or  ten  hours  in  peace  time.  We  spent 
thirty  hours  over  it,  and  that  was  con- 
sidered good  going.  The  theory  of  circulat- 
ing trains  turned  out  to  be  entirely  wrong. 
We  changed  at  wayside  stations,  standing 
for  hours  on  desolate  platforms.  We  pur- 
sued trains  into  remote  sidings  in  the  middle 
of  the  night,  tripping  over  wires  and  stum- 
bling among  sleepers.  We  ate  things  of  an 
unusual  kind  at  odd  hours.  We  slept  by 
snatches.  I  shaved  and  washed  in  a  tin 
mug  full  of  water  drawn  from  the  side  of 
an  engine.  M.,  indomitably  cheerful,  secured 
buns  and  apples  at  6  o'clock  in  the  morn- 
ing. He  paid  for  the  buns.  I  believe  he 
looted  the  apples  out  of  a  truck  in  a  siding 
near  our  carriage. 

We  found  ourselves  at  noon  in  a  large 
town  with  four  hours'  leisure  before  us.  An 
R.T.O. — we  reported  to  every  R.T.O.  we 
could  find — recommended  an  excellent  res- 
taurant. M.  shaved  and  washed  elaborately 
in  a  small  basin  which  the  thoughtful  pro- 
prietor had  placed  in  the  passage  outside 
the  dining-room  door.  We  had  a  huge 
meal  and  made  friends  with  a  French  officer 
who  was  attached  to  some  of  our  troops  as 
interpreter.  He  had  spent  two  years  before 


48     A  JOURNEY   IN  THE  WAR  ZONE 

the  war  at  Cambridge.  There  perhaps, 
more  probably  elsewhere,  he  had  been  taught 
that  Mr.  and  Mrs.  Sidney  Webb  are  the 
most  influential  people  in  England,  and 
that  Mr.  H.  G.  Wells,  though  not  from  a 
purely  literary  point  of  view  a  great  writer, 
is  the  most  profound  philosopher  in  the 
world.  He  deeply  lamented  the  fact  that 
compulsory  military  service  had  just  been 
introduced  into  England. 

"  The  last  fortress  of  individual  liberty," 
he  said,  "  has  fallen.  The  world  is  now 
militarised." 

I  reminded  him  that  Ireland  still  re- 
mained a  free  country ;  but  he  did  not 
seem  consoled.  He  took  the  view  that  the 
Irish,  though  not  compelled  to  fight,  are 
an  oppressed  people. 

I  found  that  interpreter  an  interesting 
man,  though  he  would  not  talk  about  the 
early  fighting  at  Charleroi  where  he  had 
been  wounded.  I  should  much  rather  have 
heard  about  that.  Lyrical  eulogies  of  Mr. 
and  Mrs.  Sidney  Webb  seemed  out  of  place. 
I  had  been  "  militarised  "  for  no  more  than 
four  days.  But  I  already  felt  as  if  the 
world  in  which  clever  people  suppose  them- 
selves to  think  were  a  half-forgotten  dream. 
The  only  reality  for  me  was  that  other 


A  JOURNEY  IN   THE  WAR   ZONE     4d 

world  in  which  men,  who  do  not  profess  to 
be  clever,  suppose  themselves  to  be  doing 
things.  On  the  whole  the  soldiers,  though 
they  fuss  a  good  deal,  seem  to  have  a  better 
record  of  actual  accomplishment  than  the 
thinkers. 

The  last  stage  of  our  journey — an  affair 
of  some  six  hours — was  unexciting.  I  think 
I  should  have  slept  through  the  whole  of 
it  if  it  had  not  been  for  a  major,  plainly  a 
"  dug-out "  who  had  not  gone  soldiering  for 
many  years.  He  had  landed  from  England 
a  day  before  we  did,  and  had,  by  his  own 
account,  been  tossed  about  northern  France 
like  a  shuttlecock,  the  different  R.T.O.'s 
he  dealt  with  being  the  battledores.  He  had 
been  put  into  trains  going  the  wrong  way, 
dragged  out  of  them  and  put  into  others 
which  did  not  stop  at  his  particular  station. 
He  was  hungry,  which  he  disliked ;  dirty, 
which  he  disliked  still  more ;  and  was 
beginning  to  lose  hope  of  ever  reaching  his 
destination.  M.  slept ;  but  then  M.  was 
at  the  far  end  of  the  compartment.  The 
other  three  people  with  us  were  French,  and 
the  major  could  not  speak  their  language. 
It  was  to  me  that  he  expressed  his  feelings, 
so  I  could  not  sleep. 

We   reached   H.    at   10   p.m.,    almost   as 
4 


50    A  JOURNEY  IN  THE   WAR  ZONE 

fagged  and  quite  as  dirty  as  that  major. 
I  had  already  learned  something.  I  was 
determined  not  to  report  myself  to  any  one 
until  I  had  washed,  slept,  and  eaten.  It 
was  snowing  heavily  when  we  arrived.  With 
the  help  of  a  military  policeman  whom  we 
met  we  found  an  hotel.  He  told  us  that 
it  was  a  first-rate  place ;  but  he  was  no 
judge  of  hotels.  It  was  very  far  from  being 
good.  We  had,  however,  every  reason  to 
be  thankful  to  that  policeman.  We  secured 
two  beds.  While  we  were  smoking  our  final 
pipes,  two  young  officers  turned  up.  They 
had  been  round  all  the  good  hotels  in  the 
town  and  failed  to  find  accommodation. 
They  failed  again  in  our  hotel.  We  had 
engaged  the  last  two  beds.  They  went  off 
sadly  to  sleep  on  the  platform  in  the  railway 
station.  If  our  policeman  had  known  more 
about  hotels  and  sent  us  to  a  good  one,  it 
might  very  well  have  been  our  fate  to  sleep 
on  the  platform. 

Next  morning,  M.,  who  is  extraordinarily 
persevering,  secured  a  bath.  It  is  a  great 
advantage  when  in  France  not  to  know  any 
French.  M.  is  wholly  unaffected  when  the 
proprietor  of  an  hotel,  the  proprietor's  wife, 
the  head  waiter,  and  several  housemaids 
assure  him  with  one  voice  that  a  bath  is 


A  JOURNEY   IN   THE  WAR  ZONK     51 

tout  d  fait  impossible.  He  merely  smiles  and 
says  :  "  Very  well  then,  bring  it  along  or 
show  me  where  it  is."  In  the  end  he  gets 
it,  and,  fortunate  in  his  companionship,  so 
do  I. 


CHAPTER    IV 

SETTLING   DOWN 

THERE  are,  or  used  to  be,  people  who  believe 
that  you  can  best  teach  a  boy  to  swim  by 
throwing  him  into  deep  water  from  the  end 
of  a  pier  and  leaving  him  there.  If  he 
survives,  he  has  learned  to  swim  and  the 
method  has  proved  its  value.  If  he  drowns, 
his  parents  have  no  further  anxiety  about 
him.  The  authorities  who  are  responsible 
for  the  religion  of  the  army  believe  in  this 
plan  for  teaching  chaplains  their  business. 
Having  accepted  a  civilian  parson  as  a 
volunteer,  they  dump  him  down  in  a  camp 
without  instruction  or  advice,  without  even 
so  much  as  a  small  red  handbook  on  field 
tactics  to  guide  him.  There  he  splutters 
about,  makes  an  ass  of  himself  in  various 
ways,  and  either  hammers  out  some  plan  for 
getting  at  his  job  by  many  bitter  failures, 
or  subsides  into  the  kind  of  man  who  sits 
in  the  mess-room  with  his  feet  on  the  stove, 

reading    novels    and    smoking    cigarettes — 

ia 


SETTLING   DOWN  53 

either  learns  to  swim  after  a  fashion  or 
drowns  unlamented. 

M.,  who  had  at  all  events  three  months' 
English  experience  behind  him,  found  him- 
self on  the  top  of  a  steep  hill,  the  controller 
of  a  wooden  church  planted  in  the  middle 
of  a  sea  of  sticky  mud.  He  ministered  to 
a  curiously  mixed  assortment  of  people, 
veterinary  men,  instructors  in  all  kind  of 
military  arts,  A.S.C.  men,  and  the  men  of 
a  camp  known  as  Base  Horse  Transport. 

The  army  authorities  have  been  laughed 
at  since  the  war  began  on  account  of  their 
passion  for  inverting  the  names  of  things. 
You  must  not,  if  you  want  such  a  thing, 
say  one  pot  of  raspberry  jam.  You  say, 
instead,  jam,  raspberry,  pot,  one.  It  is 
odd  that  in  the  few  cases  in  which  such 
inversion  is  really  desirable  the  authorities 
refuse  to  practise  it.  Horse  Transport,  Base, 
would  be  intelligible  after  thought.  Base 
Horse  Transport,  till  you  get  accustomed 
to  it,  seems  a  gratuitous  insult  to  a  number 
of  worthy  animals,  not  perhaps  highly  bred 
but  strong  and  active. 

Base  Detail  is  another  example  of  the 
same  thing.  To  describe  a  man  as  a  detail 
is  bad  enough.  To  call  him  a  Base  Detail 
must  lower  his  self-respect,  and  as  a  rule 


54  SETTLING  DOWN 

these  poor  fellows  have  done  nothing  to 
deserve  it.  A  Base  Details  Camp  contains, 
for  the  most  part,  men  who  have  just  re- 
covered from  wounds  received  in  the  service 
of  King  and  Country.  "  Details  "  perhaps 
is  unavoidable,  but  it  would  surely  be  pos- 
sible to  conform  to  the  ordinary  army 
usage  and  call  the  place  Camp,  Details, 
Base. 

My  fate  was  more  fortunate-  than  M.'s. 
I  had  no  church — he  had  the  better  of  me 
there — but  I  was  put  into  a  homogeneous 
camp,  an  Infantry  Base.  (Our  colonel  was 
a  masterful  man.  He  would  not  have 
allowed  us  to  be  called  Base  Infantry.) 
There  was  a  small  permanent  staff  in  the 
camp,  the  colonel,  the  adjutant,  the  doctor, 
and  myself  among  the  officers,  a  sergeant- 
major,  an  orderly-room  staff,  and  a  few 
others  among  the  men.  Every  one  else 
passed  in  and  out  of  the  camp,  coming  to 
us  from  England  in  drafts,  or  from  hospitals 
as  details,  going  from  us  as  drafts  into  the 
mists  of  the  front.  Our  camp  occupied  the 
place  of  a  reservoir  in  a  city's  water  supply. 
The  men  and  officers  flowed  in  to  us  from 
many  sources,  stayed  a  while  and  flowed  out 
again  through  the  conduits  of  troop  trains 
when  the  insatiable  fighting  army,  per- 


SETTLING  DOWN  55 

petually  using  and  losing  men,  turned  on 
its  taps,  demanding  fresh  supply. 

It  happened,  I  do  not  know  why,  that 
there  had  never  been  a  chaplain  specially 
attached  to  that  camp  before.  I  have  no 
reason  to  suppose  that  a  chaplain  had  been 
asked  for  or  was  specially  desired.  I  ex- 
pected, at  best,  to  be  tolerated  as  a  necessary 
evil ;  at  worst  to  be  made  to  feel  that  I 
was  a  nuisance. 

I  was,  in  fact,  extremely  kindly  received. 
My  experience  is  that  a  chaplain  is  almost 
always  well  received  both  by  officers  and 
men  in  France,  and  is  very  much  less  a 
stranger  than  a  parson  at  home  who  finds 
himself  in  a  club  where  he  is  not  well  known. 
But  I  do  not  pretend  that  my  first  evening 
in  that  mess  was  a  particularly  comfortable 
one.  As  it  happened,  neither  the  colonel 
nor  the  adjutant  was  there.  I  had  as 
companions  half  a  dozen  officers,  any  one 
of  whom  was  young  enough  to  be  my  son. 
They  were  laboriously  polite  and  appallingly 
respectful.  We  talked  to  each  other  in 
restrained  whispers  and  I  do  not  think  that 
any  one  laughed  during  the  whole  course 
of  dinner. 

My  discomfort  lasted  far  beyond  that 
evening,  and  I  do  not  wonder  that  it  took  me 


56  SETTLING   DOWN 

some  time  to  settle  down.  I  came,  for  the 
first  time  in  my  life,  under  military  discipline. 
I  lived  in  a  mess,  a  strange  kind  of  life  for 
me.  I  had  to  obey  rules  which  I  did  not 
know  and  conform  to  an  etiquette  which 
was  utterly  strange  to  me.  Looking  back 
over  it  all  now  I  realise  that  I  must  have 
blundered  horribly,  and  trodden,  without 
intending  to,  on  all  sorts  of  tender  feet. 
Yet,  from  the  moment  I  entered  the  camp 
I  received  nothing  but  kindness  and  con- 
sideration. 

The  officers  of  our  old  army  are  wonderful. 
Every  one,  I  think,  agrees  about  this.  To 
me  it  seems  that  one  of  the  most  wonderful 
things  about  them  is  the  way  they  have 
treated  civilians,  amateurs,  always  ignorant, 
often  conceited,  who  suddenly  burst  into 
their  highly  organised  profession.  Now  and 
then,  though  rarely,  I  came  across  senior 
officers  set  temporarily  in  positions  of  com- 
mand who  were  objectionable  or  silly,  who 
'*  assumed  the  god  "  and  made  themselves 
ridiculous.  But  these  were  seldom  regular 
soldiers.  And  perhaps  what  I  resented 
arose  from  too  much  zeal,  was  an  attempt, 
by  wrong  ways,  to  achieve  a  kind  of  dignity 
which  every  one  respects. 

Looking    back   over    the    period   of    my 


SETTLING  DOWN  57 

service  I  do  not  know  that  I  met  more  than 
two  or  three  of  this  kind,  tyrants  to  their 
men,  insolent  to  officers  of  lower  rank. 
The  regular  soldier,  who  has  given  his  life 
to  his  profession  and  has  generally  served 
and  fought  in  various  corners  of  the  world, 
is  amazingly  considerate  and  helpful  to 
outsiders  even  when  they  are  gauche  and 
awkward. 

The  adjutant  received  me  in  the  orderly- 
room  when  I  reached  the  camp,  some  time 
after  dark.  I  was  as  respectful  as  possible 
for  I  thought  he  was  the  colonel.  Even  if 
I  had  known  him  for  an  adjutant  I  should 
still  have  been  respectful,  for  I  like  to  be 
on  the  safe  side  of  things  and  I  had  not  the 
remotest  idea  what  the  position  and  functions 
of  an  adjutant  are.  I  know  now  that  he  is 
something  like  an  archdeacon,  a  man  of 
enormous  importance  whose  duties  it  is  a 
little  difficult  to  define  exactly.  He  ex- 
pected me.  With  the  help  of  the  sergeant- 
major  he  had  found  a  servant  for  me  and 
assigned  a  hut  to  me. 

For  the  servant  I  have  nothing  but  praise. 
He  could  and  did  darn  socks  well.  Indeed 
he  confided  to  me  that  when  at  home  he 
darned  his  wife's  stockings,  being  much 
better  at  the  job  than  she  was.  He  could 


58  SETTLING   DOWN 

talk  to  French  people  in  a  language  that 
was  neither  theirs  nor  his,  but  which  they 
understood  without  difficulty.  He  was  very 
punctual  and  he  did  not  like  the  kind  of 
tobacco  which  I  smoke.  His  one  fault  was 
that  he  did  not  know  whether  an  oil  stove 
was  smoking  or  not  and  could  not  learn.  I 
am  often  haunted  by  the  recollection  of  one 
snowy  night  on  which  I  arrived  at  my  hut 
to  find  the  whole  air  inside  dense  with  fine 
black  smuts.  I  had  to  drag  everything  I 
possessed  out  of  the  hut  into  the  snow.  It 
took  me  hours  to  get  myself  clean  after  that 
night,  and  I  still  find  traces  of  lampblack 
on  some  of  the  garments  which  suffered 
with  me. 

But  that  inability  to  deal  with  lamps 
was  my  servant's  one  failing.  In  every 
other  respect  I  was  satisfied  with  him.  I 
hope  he  was  equally  satisfied  with  me.  He 
was  at  first.  I  know  that ;  for  he  asked 
for  the  congratulations  of  a  friend  on  his 
appointment.  "  I  have  got  a  soft  job  at 
last,"  he  said.  "  I'm  an  officer's  servant, 
and  a  chaplain's  at  that."  The  job,  I 
imagine,  continued  to  be  a  soft  one  all  the 
time  I  was  in  France ;  but  I  am  not  sure 
that  he  would  have  said  "  and  a  chaplain's 
at  that  "  quite  so  complacently  the  morning 


SETTLING   DOWN  59 

after  my  scene  with  the  oil  stove  in  the  snow 
storm.  Chaplains  do  not,  of  course,  swear  ; 
but  any  one  who  studies  the  Psalms  gains  a 
certain  command  of  language  which  can  be 
used  effectively  and  without  scandal. 

For  the  hut  I  cannot  say  anything  good. 
This  was  in  no  way  the  adjutant's  fault. 
He  had  nothing  else  except  that  hut  to  offer 
me.  It  was  made  of  brown  canvas,  stretched 
over  a  wooden  frame.  It  was  lit  by  small 
square  patches  of  oiled  canvas  let  into  its 
walls  at  inconvenient  places.  It  had  a 
wooden  door  which  was  blown  open  and 
shut  on  windy  nights  and  could  not  be 
securely  fastened  in  either  position.  There 
was  a  corrugated-iron  roof— apparently  not 
part  of  the  original  plan  of  the  hut — on  which 
pouring  rain  made  an  abominable  noise. 
The  floor  bent  and  swayed  when  walked 
on.  Small  objects,  studs  and  coins,  slipped 
between  the  boards  of  the  floor  and  became 
the  property  of  the  rats  which  held  revel 
there  night  and  day. 

The  hut  was  cold  in  winter  and  stiflingly 
hot  in  summer.  Draughts  whistled  through 
its  walls  and  up  between  its  boards  when 
the  wind  blew.  On  calm  nights  it  was 
impossible  to  get  any  fresh  air  into  it  at  all. 
The  canvas  was  liable  to  catch  fire  on  the 


60  SETTLING   DOWN 

smallest  provocation.  I  do  not  think  there 
can  be  in  the  world  any  more  detestable 
form  of  human  habitation  than  huts  like 
that.  Mine  was  not  unique.  There  were 
hundreds  of  them  in  those  camps.  They 
were,  I  am  told,  the  invention  of  a  man  who 
succeeded  in  palming  off  these  fruits  of 
stupidity  and  malice  on  the  War  Office. 
They  were  called  by  his  name.  If  I  knew 
how  to  spell  it  I  should  set  it  down  here 
for  public  execration.  I  expect  he  made 
a  fortune  out  of  his  huts. 

My  first  few  nights  in  that  hut  were  cold 
and  unhappy,  for  I  slept  on  the  floor  in  a 
"flea  bag."  Then,  with  the  help  of  the 
quartermaster,  I  secured  a  camp  bedstead 
and  was  much  less  uncomfortable.  The 
quartermaster  came  from  Galway  and  was 
sympathetic  with  a  particularly  helpless 
fellow-countryman.  He  served  me  out 
blankets  until  I  was  ashamed  to  accept 
any  more.  He  supplied  the  oil  stove,  and 
it  kept  my  bath  water  from  freezing  during 
the  night  when  it  could  be  got  to  burn 
without  smoking. 

My  servant  "  acquired  "  packing  cases  and 
arranged  them  as  washstand  and  dressing- 
table.  He  hung  cords  like  clothes  lines 
across  the  corners  of  the  hut  and  suspended 


SETTLING  DOWN  61 

my  kit  on  them.  He  watched  the  comings 
and  goings  of  other  officers  and  looted  from 
vacant  huts  a  whole  collection  of  useful 
articles — a  lantern  which  held  a  candle,  a 
nest  of  pigeon-holes,  three  bookshelves,  a 
chair  without  a  back,  a  tin  mug  for  shaving 
water,  and  a  galvanised  iron  pot  which  made 
an  excellent  basin.  He  spent  a  whole  morn- 
ing making  and  fixing  up  outside  my  door 
a  wooden  boot-scraper.  I  suppose  he  hoped 
in  this  way  to  prevent  my  covering  the  floor 
of  the  hut  with  mud.  But  the  effort  was 
wasted.  The  scraper  lay  down  flat  on  its 
side  whenever  I  touched  it  with  my  foot, 
It  remained  a  distinguishing  ornament  of 
my  hut,  useful  as  a  guide  to  any  one  who 
wanted  to  know  where  I  lived,  but  no  good  for 
any  other  purpose.  In  this  way  I  gradually 
became  possessed  of  a  kind  of  Robinson 
Crusoe  outfit  of  household  furniture. 

I  cannot  say  that  I  was  ever  com- 
fortable in  that  hut.  Yet  the  life  agreed 
with  me.  It  is  evidently  a  mistake  to  sup- 
pose that  damp  beds,  damp  clothes,  and 
shivering  fits  at  night  are  injurious  to  health. 
It  is  most  unpleasant  but  it  is  not  unwhole- 
some to  have  to  rise  at  2  a.m.  or  3  a.m.  and 
run  up  and  down  in  the  rain  to  get  warm 
enough  to  go  to  sleep. 


62  SETTLING   DOWN 

Yet  I  escaped  without  even  a  cold  in  my 
head.  I  should  be  most  ungrateful  if  I 
wished  any  real  harm  to  the  inventor  of 
those  huts.  But  perhaps  some  day  his 
health  will  give  way  and  he  will  find  himself 
suffering  from  rheumatism,  congestion  of 
the  lungs,  or  frost  bite.  Then  I  hope  he 
will  try  a  winter  in  one  of  his  own  huts.  He 
will  not  like  it,  but  he  will  be  a  healthy 
man  again  before  spring — if  he  is  not  dead. 


CHAPTER    V 

KHAKI 

WAR  must  always  have  been  a  miserable 
business  ;  but  our  fathers  and  grandfathers 
had  the  sense  to  give  it  an  outward  semblance 
of  gaiety.  They  went  forth  to  battle  dressed 
in  the  brightest  colours  they  could  find. 
They  put  feathers  in  their  hats.  They 
sewed  gold  braid  on  their  coats.  They  hung 
sparkling  metal  about  their  persons.  They 
had  brass  bands  to  march  in  front  of  them. 
While  engaged  in  the  business  of  killing 
their  enemies  they  no  doubt  wallowed  in 
mud,  just  as  we  do ;  went  hungry,  sweated, 
shivered,  were  parched  or  soaked,  grumbled 
and  cursed.  But  they  made  a  gallant  effort 
at  pretending  to  enjoy  themselves.  They 
valued  the  properties  of  romantic  drama, 
though  they  must  have  recognised  soon 
enough  that  the  piece  in  which  they  played 
was  the  sordidest  of  tragedies. 

We  are  realists.     Not  for  us  the  scarlet 
coats,  the  tossing  plumes,  the  shining  helmets 

63 


64  KHAKI 

or  tall  busbies.  War  is  muddy,  monotonous, 
dull,  infinitely  toilsome.  We  have  staged 
it  with  a  just  appreciation  of  its  nature. 
We  have  banished  colour.  As  far  as  possible 
we  have  banished  music. 

I  suppose  we  are  right.  If  it  is  really 
true  that  a  soldier  is  more  likely  to  be  killed 
when  wearing  a  scarlet  coat,  it  is  plain 
common  sense  to  dress  him  in  mud  colour. 
If  music  attracts  the  enemy's  fire,  then 
bands  should  be  left  at  home  to  play  for 
nursemaids  in  parks  and  on  piers.  Yet 
there  is  something  to  be  said  for  the  practice 
of  our  ancestors.  The  soldier's  business  is 
to  kill  the  enemy  as  well  as  to  avoid  being 
killed  himself.  Indeed  killing  is  his  first 
duty,  and  he  only  tries  to  avoid  being  killed 
for  the  sake  of  being  efficient. 

A  cheerful  soldier  is  a  much  more  effective 
fighter  than  a  depressed  soldier.  Our  an- 
cestors knew  this  and  designed  uniforms 
with  a  view  to  keeping  up  men's  spirits.  We 
have  ignored  their  wisdom  and  decked  our- 
selves in  khaki.  I  can  imagine  nothing 
better  calculated  to  depress  the  spirits,  to 
induce  despondency,  and  to  lower  vitality 
than  khaki.  The  British  soldier  remains 
cheerful — indeed  it  is  largely  his  unfailing 
cheerfulness  which  makes  him  the  splendid 


KHAKI  65 

fighting  man  he  is — but  he  has  had  to  keep 
up  his  spirits  without  help  from  the  authori- 
ties who  have  coloured  his  whole  life  khaki 
and  deprived  him  of  music. 

I  was  placed  in  a  camp  which  was  one  of 
a  series  of  camps  stretching  along  a  winding 
valley.  To  right  and  left  of  us  were  steep 
hills,  and  off  the  side  of  one  of  them,  that 
on  which  M.  lived,  the  grass  had  been 
scraped  and  hacked.  There  remained  mud 
which  harmonised  tonelessly  with  our  uni- 
forms. Under  our  feet  as  we  walked  along 
the  roads  and  paths  which  led  from  end  to 
end  of  the  valley  there  was  mud.  The 
parade  grounds — each  camp  had  one — were 
mud.  The  tents  were  mud-coloured  or  dirty 
grey.  The  orderly-rooms,  mess-rooms,  re- 
creation huts  and  all  the  rest  were  mud 
coloured  and  had  soiled  grey  roofs.  Men 
mud-coloured  from  head  to  foot  paraded  in 
lines,  marched,  or  strolled  about  or  sat  on 
mud  banks  smoking. 

Even  the  women  who  served  in  the  can- 
teens and  recreation  huts  refused  to  wear 
bright  frocks,  succumbing  to  the  prevailing 
oppression  of  mud.  The  authorities  have 
put  even  these  women  into  khaki  now,  but 
that  has  made  little  difference.  Before  that 
order  came  out  the  ladies  had  failed  ta 
5 


66  KHAKI 

realise  that  it  was  their  duty  to  deck  them- 
selves in  scarlet,  green,  and  gold,  to  save  the 
rest  of  us  from  depression. 

Mr.  Wells  went  out  to  see  the  war  at  one 
time,  and  returned  to  make  merry,  rather 
ponderously,  over  the  fact  that  some  officers 
still  wear  spurs.  Perhaps  if  Mr.  Wells  had 
lived  for  two  months  in  a  large  camp  wholly 
given  over  to  the  devil  of  khaki  he  would 
have  taken  a  different  view  of  spurs.  They 
are  almost  the  only  things  left  in  war  which 
glitter.  They  are  of  incalculable  value.  So 
far  from  stripping  them  from  the  boots  of 
officers  supposed  to  be  mounted,  additional 
spurs  should  be  worn  on  other  parts  of  the 
uniform,  on  shoulder  straps  for  instance, 
with  a  view  to  improving  the  spirits,  and 
therefore  the  moral,  of  the  army. 

It  does  not  in  the  least  matter  that  spurs 
are  seldom  driven  into  the  sides  of  horses. 
No  one  now  uses  spurs  as  goads.  They  are 
worn  for  the  sake  of  the  shine  and  glitter  of 
them.  In  the  fortunate  owner  they  are  an 
inspiriting  evidence  of  "  swank."  To  every 
one  else  they  are,  as  Ireland  used  to  be, 
44  the  one  bright  spot "  in  a  desperately 
drab  world.  M.,  a  wiser  man  than  I,  always 
wore  spurs,  though  I  do  not  think  he  ever 
used  them  on  his  horses.  He  was  naturally 


KHAKI  67 

a  man  of  buoyant  cheerfulness,  and  I  daresay 
would  not  have  succumbed  to  khaki  de- 
pression even  if  he  had  worn  no  spurs.  But 
I  think  the  spurs  helped  him.  I  know  the 
sight  of  them  helped  me  when  they  glittered 
on  the  heels  of  his  boots  as  he  tramped 
along,  or  glanced  in  the  firelight  when  he 
crossed  his  legs  in  front  of  the  mess-room 
stove. 

For  a  long  time  after  settling  down  in 
that  camp  I  was  vaguely  uneasy  without 
being  able  to  discover  what  was  the  matter 
with  me.  I  was  thoroughly  healthy.  I 
was  well  fed.  I  was  associating  with  kindly 
and  agreeable  men.  I  had  plenty  of  inter- 
esting work  to  do.  Yet  I  was  conscious 
of  something  wrong.  It  was  not  home- 
sickness, a  feeling  I  know  well  and  can 
recognise.  It  was  not  fear.  I  was  as  safe 
as  if  I  had  been  in  England. 

I  discovered,  by  accident,  that  I  was 
suffering  from  an  unsatisfied  yearning  for 
colour.  Drafts  of  a  Scottish  regiment  came 
out  from  home  wearing  bright-red  hackles 
in  their  caps ;  unmistakable  spots  of  colour 
amid  our  drab  surroundings.  I  found  my 
eyes  following  these  men  about  the  camp 
with  a  curious  pleasure,  and  I  realised 
that  what  I  wanted  was  to  see  red,  or 


68  KHAKI 

blue,  or  green,  or  anything  else  except 
khaki.  - 

Later  on  an  order  came  out  that  camp 
commandants  should  wear  coloured  cap- 
bands  and  coloured  tabs  on  their  coat.  It 
suddenly  became  a  joy  to  meet  a  colonel. 
Certain  camps  flew  flags  in  front  of  their 
orderly-rooms.  Very  often  the  weather  had 
faded  the  colours,  but  it  was  a  satisfaction 
to  feel  that  once,  at  all  events,  the  things 
had  not  been  drab.  The  Y.M.C.A.,  adding 
without  meaning  to  another  to  its  long  list 
of  good  deeds,  kept  its  bright -red  triangle 
before  our  eyes.  It  seems  absurd  to  mention 
such  things ;  but  I  suppose  that  a  starving 
man  will  count  a  few  crumbs  a  feast. 

I  am  not  a  painter.  If  any  one  had 
talked  to  me  before  I  went  to  France  of  the 
value  of  colour,  I  should  have  laughed  at 
him.  Now,  having  lived  for  months  without 
colour,  I  know  better.  Men  want  colour 
just  as  they  want  liquid  and  warmth.  They 
are  not  at  their  best  without  it. 

Nothing  seemed  stranger  to  me  at  first, 
nothing  seems  more  pathetic  now  than  the 
pains  which  men  took  to  introduce  a  little 
colour  into  the  drab  world  in  which  we 
were  condemned  to  live.  Outside  orderly- 
rooms  and  other  important  places  men  made 


KHAKI  69 

arrangements  of  coloured  stones.  Some- 
times a  regimental  crest  was  worked  out, 
with  elaborate  attention  to  detail,  in  pebbles, 
painted  yellow,  blue,  and  green.  Sometimes 
the  stones  were  arranged  in  meaningless 
geometrical  patterns.  They  were  always 
brightly  coloured. 

There  was  a  widespread  enthusiasm  for 
gardening.  Every  square  yard  of  unused 
mud  in  that  great  series  of  camps  was  seized 
and  turned  into  flower-beds.  Men  laboured 
at  them,  putting  in  voluntarily  an  amount 
of  work  which  they  would  have  grudged 
bitterly  for  any  other  purpose.  They 
wanted  flowers,  not  vegetables,  though  any 
eatable  green  thing  would  have  been  a  treat 
to  them. 

When  spring  and  early  summer  came  to 
us  we  rejoiced  in  the  result  of  our  labours, 
frequently  fantastic,  sometimes  as  nearly 
ridiculous  as  flowers  can  be.  There  were 
beds  of  daffodils  and  hyacinths  in  which  it 
was  possible,  when  the  designer  acted  as 
showman,  to  recognise  regimental  crests. 
The  French  flag  came  out  well,  if  the  flowers 
of  the  tricolour  consented  to  bloom  at  the 
same  time.  A  sergeant,  who  professed  to 
be  an  expert,  arranged  a  bed  for  me  which 
he  said  would  look  like  a  Union  Jack  in 


70  KHAKI 

June.  Unfortunately  I  left  the  place  early 
in  May,  and  I  have  heard  nothing  since 
about  that  Union  Jack.  I  suppose  it  failed 
in  some  way.  If  it  had  succeeded,  some 
one  would  have  told  me  about  it.  A  fellow- 
countryman  of  mine  designed  a  shamrock 
in  blue  lobelia.  The  medical  Red  Cross 
looked  well  in  geraniums  imported  from 
England  at  great  expense. 

Generally  our  efforts  were  along  more 
conventional  lines.  I  remember  a  rose- 
garden  with  a  sundial  in  the  middle  of  it. 
The  roses,  to  preserve  them  from  frost, 
were  carefully  wrapped  in  sacking  during 
severe  weather,  and  an  irreverent  soldier, 
fresh  from  the  trenches,  commented  on  the 
fact  that  "  These  blighters  at  the  base  are 
growing  sandbags." 

We  were  short  of  implements,  but  we  dug. 
I  have  seen  table  forks  and  broken  dinner 
knives  used  effectively.  I  have  seen  grass, 
when  there  was  grass,  clipped  with  a  pair 
of  scissors.  Kindly  people  in  England  sent 
us  out  packets  of  seeds,  but  we  were  very 
often  beaten  by  the  names  on  them.  We 
sowed  in  faith  and  hope,  not  knowing  what 
manner  of  thing  an  antirrhinum  might  be. 

I  do  not  believe  that  it  was  any  form  of 
nostalgia,  any  longing  for  home  surroundings, 


KHAKI  71 

which  made  gardeners  of  the  most  unlikely 
of  us.  Heaven  knows  the  results  we 
achieved  were  unlike  anything  we  had  ever 
seen  at  home.  It  was  not  love  of  gardening 
which  set  us  digging  and  planting.  Men 
gardened  in  those  camps  who  never  gardened 
before,  and  perhaps  never  will  again.  At 
the  bottom  of  it  all  was  an  instinctive, 
unrealised  longing  for  colour.  We  knew 
that  flowers,  if  we  could  only  grow  them, 
would  not  have  khaki  petals,  that,  war  or 
no  war,  we  should  feast  our  eyes  on  red 
and  blue. 

Newspapers  and  politicians  used  to  talk 
about  this  as  "  the  war  to  end  war,"  the 
last  war.  Perhaps  they  were  right.  We 
may  at  least  fairly  hope  that  this  is  the 
world's  last  khaki  war.  It  is  not  indeed 
likely  that  when  men  next  fight  they  will 
revert  to  scarlet  coats  and  shining  breast- 
plates. We  have  grown  out  of  these  crude 
attempts  at  romanticism. 

But  it  is  very  interesting  to  note  the 
increase  of  attention  given  to  camouflage. 
It  occurred  to  some  one — the  wonder  is  that 
it  did  not  occur  to  him  sooner — that  a 
mud- coloured  tiger,  a  tiger  with  a  khaki 
skin,  would  be  more  visible,  not  less  visible, 
than  a  tiger  with  its  natural  bright  stripes. 


72  KHAKI 

It  was  our  seamen  who  first  grasped  the 
importance  of  this  truth  and  began  to  paint 
ships  blue,  yellow,  and  red,  with  a  view  to 
making  it  difficult  for  submarine  commanders 
to  see  them.  There  are,  I  believe,  a  number 
of  artists  now  engaged  in  drawing  out  colour 
schemes  for  steamers.  I  have  seen  a  mother 
ship  of  hydroplanes  which  looked  like  a 
cubist  picture. 

Landsmen  are  more  conservative  and 
slower  to  grasp  new  ideas.  But  even  in  my 
time  in  France  tents  were  sometimes  covered 
with  broad  curves  of  bright  colours.  They 
looked  very  funny  near  at  hand ;  but  they 
are — this  seems  to  be  established — much  less 
easily  seen  by  airmen  than  white  or  brown 
tents.  It  seems  a  short  step  to  take  from 
colouring  tents  to  colouring  uniforms.  In 
the  next  war,  if  there  be  a  next  war,  regi- 
ments will  perhaps  move  against  the  enemy 
gay  as  kingfishers  and  quite  as  difficult  to 
see.  Fighting  men  will  look  to  each  other 
like  ladies  in  the  beauty  chorus  of  a  revue. 
By  the  enemy  they  will  not  be  seen  at  all. 
War  will  not,  in  its  essentials,  be  any 
pleasanter,  however  we  dress  ourselves. 
Nothing  can  ever  make  a  joy  of  it.  But  at 
least  those  who  take  part  in  it  will  escape 
the  curse  of  khaki  which  lies  heavily  on  us. 


KHAKI  73 

We  suffered  a  good  deal  from  want  of 
music  when  I  went  out  to  France,  though 
things  were  better  then  than  they  had  been 
earlier.  They  certainly  improved  still 
further  later  on.  Music  in  old  days  was 
looked  upon  as  an  important  thing  in  war. 
The  primitive  savage  beat  drums  of  a  rude 
kind  before  setting  out  to  spear  the  warriors 
of  the  neighbouring  tribes.  Joshua's  soldiers 
stormed  Jericho  with  the  sound  of  trumpets 
in  their  ears.  Cromwell's  men  sang  psalms 
as  they  went  forward.  Montrose's  high- 
landers  charged  to  the  skirl  of  their  bag- 
pipes. Even  a  pacifist  would,  I  imagine, 
charge  if  a  good  piper  played  in  front  of  him. 

Our  regiments  had  their  bands,  and  many 
of  them  their  special  marching  tunes.  But 
we  somehow  came  to  regard  music  as 
part  of  the  peace-time,  ornamental  side  of 
soldiering.  The  mistake  was  natural  enough. 
Our  military  leaders  recognised,  far  sooner 
than  the  rest  of  us,  that  this  war  was  going 
to  be  a  grim  and  desperate  business.  Bands 
struck  them  as  out  of  place  in  it.  Music 
was  associated  in  their  minds  with  promen- 
ades at  seaside  resorts,  with  dinners  at 
fashionable  restaurants,  with  ornamental 
cavalry  evolutions  at  military  tournaments. 
We  were  not  going  to  France  to  do  musical 


74  KHAKI 

rides  or  to  stroll  about  the  sands  of  Boulogne 
with  pretty  ladies.  We  were  going  to  fight. 
Therefore,  bands  were  better  left  at  home. 
It  was  a  very  natural  mistake  to  make  ;  but 
it  was  a  mistake,  and  it  is  all  to  the  credit  of 
the  War  Office,  a  body  which  gets  very  little 
credit  for  anything,  that  it  gradually  altered 
its  policy. 

At  first  we  had  no  outdoor  music  except 
what  the  men  produced  themselves,  un- 
officially, by  singing,  by  whistling,  or  with 
mouth-organs.  Indoors  there  were  pianos 
in  most  recreation  huts,  and  the  piano 
never  had  a  moment's  rest  while  the  huts 
were  open— a  proof,  if  any  one  wanted  a 
proof,  of  the  craving  of  the  men  for  music. 
Then  bands  were  started  privately  by  the 
officers  in  different  camps.  This  was  a 
difficult  and  doubtful  business.  Funds  had 
to  be  collected  to  buy  instruments.  Musi- 
cians who  could  play  the  instruments  had 
to  be  picked  out  from  among  the  men,  and 
nobody  knew  how  to  find  them.  Hardly 
anybody  stayed  long  in  these  base  camps, 
and  a  good  musician  might  at  any  moment 
be  reft  away  and  sent  up  the  line. 

Yet  bands  came  into  existence.  An  Irish 
division  started  the  first  I  came  across, 
and  it  used  to  play  its  men  to  church  on 


KHAKI  75 

Sundays  in  a  way  that  cheered  the  rest  of 
us.  My  friend  M.'s  camps  on  top  of  the 
hill  started  a  band.  Other  camps,  which 
could  not  manage  bands,  discovered  Scottish 
pipers  and  set  them  playing  on  ceremonial 
occasions.  Later  on  in  another  place  I 
found  an  excellent  band  in  a  large  Canadian 
hospital,  and  a  convalescent  camp  started  a 
band  which  went  for  route  marches  along 
with  the  men. 

But  these  were  all  voluntary  efforts.  The 
best  that  could  be  said  for  the  higher 
authorities  is  that  they  did  not  actually 
discourage  them.  The  regimental  bands, 
which  we  ought  to  have  had  in  France,  still 
remained  at  home,  and  I  do  not  know  that 
they  did  much  playing  even  there.  I  think 
it  was  the  Brigade  of  Guards  which  first 
brought  a  band  out  to  France.  It  used  to 
play  in  the  market-place  of  the  town  which 
was  then  G.H.Q.  Later  on  another  Guards' 
band  went  on  tour  round  the  different  bases. 
There  was  no  mistake  about  the  warmth  of 
its  reception.  The  officers  and  men  gathered 
in  large  numbers  to  listen  to  it  on  the  fine 
Sunday  afternoon  when  it  played  in  the 
camp  where  I  was  stationed. 

Since  then  I  have  heard  of,  and  heard, 
other  regimental  bands  in  France.  Their 


76  KHAKI 

visits  have  been  keenly  appreciated.  But 
we  ought  to  have  more  than  occasional  visits 
from  these  bands.  It  is  probably  impossible 
to  have  them  playing  close  to  the  firing-line. 
But  it  would  be  an  enormous  advantage  if 
we  had  a  couple  of  good  regimental  bands 
at  every  base,  and  especially  in  places  where 
hospitals  are  numerous. 

It  is  a  mistake  to  regard  music  simply  as  a 
recreation  or  as  an  "  extra,"  outside  the 
regular  war  programme.  It  is  really  an 
important  factor  in  producing  and  maintain- 
ing that  elusive  but  most  important  thing 
called  moral.  Men  are  actually  braver, 
more  enduring,  more  confident,  more  en- 
thusiastic, if  they  hear  music. 

These  qualities  cannot  be  destroyed  in 
our  men  by  any  privation.  They  are  in- 
destructible in  the  race.  But  their  growth 
can  be  stimulated,  and  they  can  be  greatly 
strengthened.  A  hundred  years  ago  no  one 
would  have  doubted  the  value  of  music  in 
producing  and  maintaining  moral.  Two 
hundred  years  ago  or  thereabouts  Dryden 
wrote  a  poem  which  illustrated  the  power 
of  music.  Forty  years  ago  Tolstoi  wrote  a 
short  novel  to  show  how  a  particular  sonata 
affected  not  moral,  but  morality.  We  seem 
to  have  forgotten  the  truths  familiar  then. 


KHAKI  77 

There  ought  not  to  be  any  doubt  about 
the  value  of  music  in  restoring  health. 
Nobody  is  fool  enough  to  suppose  that  a 
broken  bone  would  set  itself,  or  fragments 
of  shrapnel  emerge  of  their  own  accord  from 
a  man's  leg  even  if  it  were  possible  to  secure 
the  services  of  the  Pied  Piper  of  Hamelin. 
But  most  doctors  admit  that  in  certain 
obscure  and  baffling  maladies,  classed  gener- 
ally as  cases  of  shell-shock,  mental  and 
spiritual  aid  are  at  least  as  useful  as  massage 
or  drugs.  Next  to  religion — which  is  an 
extremely  difficult  thing  to  get  or  apply — 
music  is  probably  the  most  powerful  means 
we  have  of  spiritual  treatment.  There  is 
an  abundant  supply  of  it  ready  to  hand. 
It  seems  a  pity  not  to  use  it  more  freely 
than  we  do. 


CHAPTER  VI 

LEISURE   HOURS 

THE  problem  which  faces  the  commandant 
of  a  base  in  France,  or  a  camp  at  home, 
must  be  very  like  that  which  a  public  school- 
master has  to  tackle.  The  business  of 
instruction  comes  first.  Men  and  officers 
must  be  taught  their  job,  as  schoolboys 
must  be  taught  their  lessons.  Hardly  less 
pressing  is  the  problem  of  spare  time.  You 
cannot  keep  a  soldier  throwing  bombs  all 
day,  and  there  is  a  limit  to  the  time  which 
can  be  occupied  in  route  marching.  The 
obvious  solution  of  the  problem  is  organised 
games  and  sports.  Most  men  are  keen 
enough  on  cricket  and  football .  Most  officers 
are  glad  to  join  tennis  clubs.  In  some  places 
in  France  there  are  plenty  of  outdoor  amuse- 
ments of  this  kind,  and  matches  are  arranged 
between  different  units  which  keep  interest 
alive. 

Where  I  was  first  stationed  games  were 
sternly  discouraged.    The  theory,  I  think, 

78 


LEISURE  HOURS  79 

was  that  the  French  people  would  be  dis- 
gusted if  they  saw  us  playing.  Perhaps 
the  French  people  in  that  neighbourhood 
were  more  seriously  minded  than  those  in 
other  parts  of  the  country.  Perhaps  they 
were  less  friendly,  and  it  was  necessary  to 
consider  their  feelings  with  particular  care. 
I  have  no  way  of  judging  about  that.  Else- 
where the  French  seemed  to  take  a  mild 
interest  in  our  passion  for  games ;  but  in 
that  district  they  may  very  well  have  been 
of  a  different  mind. 

Whether  the  official  estimate  of  the  French 
spirit  was  right  or  wrong,  the  result  for  us 
was  that  we  were  very  badly  off  for  outdoor 
games.  Football  and  cricket  were  played, 
half-heartedly,  for  matches  (on  the  plan  of 
League  matches  at  home)  were  not  allowed. 
The  formation  of  an  officers'  tennis  club  was 
forbidden. 

On  the  other  hand  the  men  were  very 
well  off  for  indoor  amusements.  Every 
Y.M.C.A.  hut  ran  concerts.  There  were  two 
large  cinema  huts  in  the  camps.  Boxing 
was  encouraged  by  many  officers,  and  inter- 
esting competitions  took  place  which  were 
eagerly  watched. 

But  as  the  days  lengthened  with  the 
coming  of  spring,  there  were  hours  which 


80  LEISURE  HOURS 

hung  very  heavily  on  every  one.  The 
officers  were  slightly  better  off  than  the 
men.  They  could  always  go  into  the  neigh- 
bouring town,  some  four  miles  off,  and  find 
a  certain  amount  of  amusement  in  walking 
about  the  streets.  But  it  was  a  singularly 
dull  town.  The  men  could  not  leave  the 
camps  without  permission,  and  a  pass  was 
not  always,  indeed  not  often,  attainable. 

Their  favourite  pastime  was  a  game 
which  they  called  "  House,"  which  was 
known  to  many  of  us  when  we  were  children 
as  Loto.  It  is  an  exceedingly  dull  game, 
and  I  cannot  believe  that  the  men  would 
have  played  it  as  they  did  if  any  other  kind 
of  game  had  been  possible.  There  is  a 
mild  element  of  gambling  about  House.  A 
small  sum  of  money  may  be  won,  a  very 
small  sum  lost.  That  I  suppose  was  the 
attraction. 

But  it  was  rather  a  pitiful  thing  to  walk 
through  the  camps  on  a  fine  afternoon  and 
to  see  every  waste  piece  of  ground  occupied 
by  House  players.  There  is  no  skill  what- 
ever in  the  game,  and  the  players  get  no 
exercise.  They  sit  on  the  ground  with  a 
pile  of  small  pebbles  before  them,  while  one 
of  them  calls  out  a  series  of  numbers.  The 
French  people,  if  they  had  seen  us  playing 


LEISURE  HOURS  81 

House,  would  have  come  to  the  conclusion 
that  we  are  a  nation  of  imbeciles.  Bad  as 
it  may  be  to  have  as  allies  men  light-hearted 
enough  to  play  cricket,  it  must  be  several 
degrees  worse  to  have  to  rely  on  imbeciles. 
However,  the  French  did  not  see  us  playing 
House  any  more  than  they  saw  us  boxing  or 
attending  concerts.  They  were  not  allowed 
into  our  camps. 

For  the  men  who  did  succeed  in  getting 
passes  out  of  camp,  the  prospect  was  dreary 
enough,  dreary  or  undesirable.  Going  into 
town  in  a  crowded  tram  is  an  amusement 
which  quickly  palls.  Various  ill-defined  por- 
tions of  the  town,  when  you  got  there,  were 
out  of  bounds,  and  a  man  had  need  to  walk 
warily  if  he  did  not  want  trouble  with  the 
military  police. 

And  there  were  worse  things  than  military 
police.  On  the  roadway  which  led  to  the 
camp  entrance  there  might  be  seen,  any  fine 
Sunday  afternoon,  a  crowd  of  French  girls 
waiting  for  the  men  who  came  out.  They 
were,  plainly,  not  the  best  girls,  though  no 
doubt  some  of  them  were  more  silly  than 
vicious.  There  were  eating-shops,  or  drink- 
ing-shops,  of  which  ugly  tales  were  told. 
Coffee,  an  innocent  drink,  was  sometimes 
doped  with  brandy,  and  men  found  them- 
6 


82  LEISURE  HOURS 

selves    half    intoxicated    without    knowing 
that  they  had  touched  drink. 

There  were,  of  course,  places  where  men 
could  go  safely.  There  was,  for  instance, 
the  Central  Y.M.C.A.  hall,  where  excellent 
food  was  to  be  had,  and  where  there  were 
books,  papers,  games,  and  a  kindly  welcome. 
But  one  Y.M.C.A.  recreation  hut  is  very  like 
another,  and  it  seems  rather  waste  of  a 
hardly-won  pass  out  of  camp  to  spend  the 
afternoon  very  much  as  it  might  be  spent 
without  leaving  camp  at  all.  What  the  men 
craved  for  was  variety,  interest,  and — what 
was  of  course  almost  unobtainable — the 
society  of  decent  women. 

I  cannot  help  feeling  that  in  condemning 
ourselves  to  desperate  dullness  we  paid  too 
high  a  price  for  the  good  opinion  of  our 
French  friends.  If  they  were  really  shocked 
at  our  levity  in  playing  games  during  the 
war,  it  would  have  been  better  to  lacerate 
their  feelings  a  little.  They  would  very 
soon  have  got  accustomed  to  our  ways  and 
come  to  regard  our  excitement  over  a  League 
match  as  nothing  worse  than  a  curious  form 
of  eccentricity. 

The  officers  were  rather  better  off  than 
the  men.  They  could  stay  in  town  long 
enough  to  dine  at  a  restaurant,  and  there  is 


LEISURE  HOURS  83 

something  rather  exciting,  for  a  short  time, 
in  dining  at  a  French  restaurant.  There 
was  a  special  officers'  tram  which  brought 
us  back  to  camp  just  in  time  to  pass  the 
sentries  before  10.30  p.m.  It  was  in- 
variably over-crowded  and  we  often  had 
to  stand,  crowded  together  on  the  platforms 
of  the  driver  and  conductor.  I  have  seen 
officers,  of  rank  which  gave  dignity,  clinging 
to  the  back  of  the  conductor's  platform 
with  their  feet  planted  insecurely  on  a 
buffer. 

I  remember  one  very  exciting  run  home. 
We  started  rather  late  from  town.  There 
was  a  thick  fog.  The  driver  was  inclined 
to  be  cautious,  very  properly ;  but  it  was 
doubtful  whether  we  could  reach  the  camp 
in  time.  I  had  found  a  precarious  place 
on  the  step  of  the  driver's  platform.  Three 
subalterns,  spirited  boys,  fresh  from  school, 
tried  to  speed  things  up  by  shouting,  "  Vite, 
Vile!"  ''Much  viler  than  that!"  to  the 
driver,  and  banging  violently  on  the  gong 
which  warned  pedestrians  of  our  coming. 
The  driver  remained  unmoved  and  the  car 
moved  very  slowly.  Two  of  the  boys  seized 
the  driver.  The  third  took  control  of  the 
tram.  I  do  not  know  whether  he  had  any 
practice  beforehand  in  electric  motor  work ; 


84  LEISURED  HOURS 

but  he  made  that  tram  go.  We  rushed 
through  the  fog,  bumping  and  rattling, 
making  very  heavy  weather  of  the  points 
at  junctions.  I  do  not  think  we  killed  any 
one.  If  we  had  we  should  have  heard  of  it 
afterwards.  We  got  back  to  camp  in  time. 
The  French  chauffeur  when  he  recovered 
his  first  shock  seemed  to  enjoy  himself. 
Our  driver  was  a  very  gallant  boy.  No 
risk  daunted  him.  I  hope  he  has  been 
transferred  into  the  Tank  service.  The  work 
there  would  suit  him  exactly  and  I  feel  sure 
he  would  enjoy  it. 

I  do  not  know  that  even  the  prospect  of 
returning  to  camp  by  the  officers'  tram 
would  have  lured  me  to  dine  in  that  town 
very  often.  One  French  hotel  is  very  like 
another,  and  I  had  dined  at  many  before 
the  war. 

But  there  was  one  restaurant  which  was 
especially  attractive.  I  should  never  have 
discovered  it  for  myself,  for  I  am  not  very 
adventurous  or  fond  of  exploring.  It  was 
situated  in  a  slum  and  approached  through 
an  abominable  alley.  It  was  found  first, 
I  believe,  by  some  A.S.C.  officers  permanently 
stationed  in  the  town,  who  had  time  on  their 
hands  for  exhaustive  research.  I  was  taken 
there  by  a  friend  who  hoped  to  have  the 


LEISURE  HOURS  85 

pleasure  of  shocking  a  parson  by  leading 
him  into  the  sort  of  place  a  parson  ought  not 
to  visit.  As  a  matter  of  fact  the  place  was 
perfectly  respectable,  and  the  only  part  of 
me  which  was  shocked  was  my  nose.  The 
smells  in  the  pitch-dark  gullies  which  led 
to  that  eating-house  were  the  worst  I 
encountered  in  France. 

It  was  a  most  unconventional  restaurant. 
The  proprietor,  an  elderly  man,  his  wife, 
and  three  married  daughters  ran  it.  They 
were,  whenever  I  entered  the  place,  engaged 
in  eating  a  meal  of  their  own  at  a  table 
near  a  large  fire  at  one  end  of  the  room. 
When  guests  appeared  they  all  rose,  uttered 
voluble  welcomes,  and  shook  hands  with 
the  strangers.  There  were,  besides  the 
family  table,  four  others,  all  of  rough  deal, 
much  stained,  far  from  clean  and  without 
table-cloths.  The  seats  were  narrow 
benches.  If  you  leaned  back  you  bumped 
the  man  at  the  next  table.  The  floor  was 
sanded  and  hens  walked  about  picking  up 
the  fragments  which  the  diners  dropped. 
When  I  knew  the  place  first  it  was  patronised 
chiefly  by  sailors,  Belgians,  and  the  A.S.C. 
officers  who  discovered  it. 

Ordering  dinner  was  an  interesting  busi- 
ness.   There  was  no  menu  card.    Monsieur 


86  LEISURE   HOURS 

and  his  family  talked  a  kind  of  French 
which  none  of  us  could  ever  understand. 
Also  they  talked  at  a  terrific  speed  and  all 
at  once,  circling  round  us.  We  knew  that  they 
were  naming  the  kinds  of  food  available,  for 
we  caught  words  like  potage  and  poisson  now 
and  then.  Our  plan  was  to  sit  still  and  nod 
occasionally.  One  of  the  daughters  made 
a  note  of  the  points  at  which  we  nodded, 
and  we  hoped  for  the  best.  The  soup  was 
generally  ready.  Everything  else  was 
cooked  before  our  eyes  on  the  fire  behind 
the  family  table. 

Madame  did  the  cooking.  The  rest  of 
the  party  sat  down  again  to  their  own  meal. 
Monsieur  exhorted  his  wife  occasionally. 
The  daughters  took  it  in  turn  to  get  up  and 
bring  us  each  course  as  madame  finished 
cooking  it.  In  this  way  we  got  a  hot  and 
excellent  dinner.  A  good  digestion  was 
promoted  by  the  long  gaps  between  the 
courses.  It  was  impossible  to  eat  fast. 
Monsieur  offered  his  guests  no  great  choice 
in  wine,  but  what  he  had  was  surprisingly 
good. 

When  dinner  was  over  and  the  bill,  a 
very  moderate  one,  paid,  the  whole  family 
shook  hands  with  us  again  and  wished  us 
every  kind  of  happiness  and  good  luck. 


LEISURE  HOURS  87 

Monsieur  then  conducted  us  to  a  back  door, 
and  let  us  loose  into  an  alley  quite  as  dark 
and  filthy  as  the  one  by  which  we  entered. 
He  was  always  firm  about  refusing  to  allow 
us  to  go  by  the  way  we  came.  I  have  no 
idea  what  his  reasons  were,  but  the  plan  of 
smuggling  us  out  of  the  establishment  gave 
us  a  pleasurable  feeling  that  we  had  been 
breaking  some  law  by  being  there.  There 
is  nothing  that  I  ever  could  find  in  King's 
Regulations  on  the  subject,  so  I  suppose 
that  if  we  sinned  at  all  it  must  have  been 
against  some  French  municipal  regulation. 

That  restaurant  may  be  quite  popular 
now;  it  was  getting  better  known  even  in 
my  time.  But  if  it  becomes  popular  it  will 
lose  its  charm.  Monsieur  and  his  family 
will  no  longer  be  able  to  shake  hands  with 
every  guest.  There  may  be  table-cloths. 
The  hens — I  always  thought  they  were  the 
poulets  we  ate  fattened  before  our  eyes — 
will  be  banished,  and  some  officious  A.P.M. 
will  put  the  place  out  of  bounds,  suspecting 
it  to  be  a  haunt  of  vice.  Its  look  and  its 
smell,  I  admit,  would  arouse  suspicion  in  the 
mind  of  any  conscientious  A.P.M.,, but  Mon- 
sieur's patrons,  if  rough,  were  respectable 
people.  Even  the  A.S.C.  officers  were  above 
reproach.  They  looked  like  men  who  were 


88  LEISURE  HOURS 

satisfied  at  having  discovered  the  best  and 
cheapest  dinner  to  be  got  in  that  town. 
I  doubt  whether  they  had  even  appreciated 
the  eccentricities  of  the  service. 

In  spite  of  our  want  of  games  and  amuse- 
ments, Ufe  in  those  camps  was  pleasant  and 
cheerful.  We  all  had  work  to  do,  and  not 
too  many  hours  of  idleness.  For  me  there 
were  long  walks  with  M.,  best  and  cheeriest 
of  comrades,  whose  spirits  and  energy  never 
failed  or  flagged.  We  saw  a  great  deal  of 
each  other  in  those  days  until  the  time 
came  at  the  end  of  April,  when  he  moved 
off  to  a  cavalry  brigade ;  a  post  into  which 
he  was  thrust  because  good  horsemen  are 
rare  among  chaplains.  There  was  always 
excellent  company  in  my  own  mess  and 
others.  Nowhere  else  have  I  met  so  many 
different  kinds  of  men. 

The  regular  soldiers,  some  of  them  old 
men,  held  themselves  as  a  separate  caste 
a  little  aloof  from  the  rest  of  us.  It  is  not 
to  be  wondered  at.  They  were  professionals, 
with  a  great  tradition  behind  them.  We 
were  amateurs,  and,  at  times,  inclined  to 
be  critical  of  old  customs  and  old  ways. 
We  came  from  every  conceivable  profession, 
and  before  the  war  had  been  engaged  in  a 
hundred  different  activities.  Among  us  were 


LEISURE  HOURS  89 

men  of  real  ability,  who  had  made  good  in 
their  own  way.  I  think  the  regular  soldiers 
were  a  little  bewildered  sometimes.  They, 
almost  as  completely  as  we,  were  plunged 
into  a  new  world.  The  wonder  is  that  they 
stood  us  as  patiently  as  they  did. 

We  had  our  mild  jokes,  and  it  was  wonder- 
ful how  long  the  mildest  jokes  will  last  in 
circumstances  like  ours.  There  was  a  story 
of  an  unfortunate  private  who  was  dragged 
before  his  colonel  for  failing  to  salute  a 
general,  a  general  who  should  have  been 
unmistakable.  In  defence  he  said  that  he 
did  not  know  it  was  a  general. 

"  But,"  said  the  colonel,  "  you  must  have 
seen  the  red  band  round  his  hat." 

"Yes,  sir,"  said  the  man,  "but  I  thought 
that  was  to  show  he  was  a  Salvation  Army 
captain." 

The  whole  camp  chuckled  over  that  story 
for  a  week.  Whether  any  one  ever  told  it 
to  the  general  I  do  not  know. 

Another  private,  an  Irishman,  arrived  in 
the  camp  one  day  from  the  firing-line.  Ours 
was  the  remotest  base;  two  days'  journey 
from  the  nearest  trench.  Between  us  and 
the  fighting  men  was  what  seemed  an 
impassable  entanglement  of  regulations, 
guarded  at  every  angle  by  R.T.O.'s  and 


90  LEISURE   HOURS 

military  police.  It  was,  any  one  would 
agree  about  this,  a  flat  impossibility  for  an 
unauthorised  person  to  travel  through  the 
zone  of  the  army's  occupation. 

Yet  this  man  did  it,  and  did  it  without 
in  the  least  intending  to.  Up  to  a  certain 
point  his  account  of  himself  was  clear.  He 
had  been  sent  off,  one  of  a  party  under 
charge  of  an  officer.  He  did  not  know — 
few  people  in  the  army  ever  do  know — 
where  he  was  going.  He  became  detached 
from  his  party  and  found  himself,  a  solitary 
unit,  at  what  seems  to  have  been  a  rail- 
head. The  colonel  who  dealt  with  him 
questioned  : 

"  Why  didn't  you  ask  the  R.T.O.  where 
you  were  to  go  ?  ' 

"  I  did  ask  him,  sir.  The  first  thing 
ever  I  did  was  to  ask  him." 

"  And  what  did  he  say  ?  " 

"  What  he  said,  sir,  was  4  Go  to  the  devil 
out  of  this.'  " 

The  colonel  checked  a  smile.  He  probably 
sympathised  with  the  R.T.O. 

"  And  what  did  you  do  then  ?  "  he  asked. 

"  I  got  into  the  train,  sir,  and  sure,  here 
•I  am." 

That  particular  colonel's  temper  was 
notoriously  a  little  soured  by  long  command. 


91 

It  was  felt  that  the  soldier  had,  after  all, 
made  a  fair  attempt  to  obey  the  orders  of 
the  R.T.O. 

Another  private — less  innocent,  I  fear — 
caused  me  and  a  few  other  people  some 
mild  excitement.  I  was  summoned  to  the 
orderly-room  to  answer  a  telephone  call. 
I  was  told  by  some  one,  whose  voice  sounded 
as  if  he  was  much  irritated,  that  he  had 
caught  the  man  who  stole  my  shirt.  No 
one,  thanks  to  my  servant's  vigilance,  had 
stolen  any  shirt  of  mine.  I  said  so. 

"  Grey  flannel  shirt,"  said  the  voice,  and 
I  gathered  that  he  was  irritated  afresh  by 
my  extreme  stupidity.  I  disclaimed  all 
knowledge  of  any  stolen  shirt,  flannel  or 
other. 

An  explanation  followed.  A  deserter  had 
been  arrested.  It  was  discovered  that  he 
was  wearing  four  flannel  shirts  and  three 
thick  garments  under  them.  "  That,"  I 
said,  "  is  good  prima  facie  evidence  that  he 
really  is  a  soldier."  I  thought  that  a  useful 
thing  to  say,  and  true.  No  one  in  the  world 
except  a  British  soldier  would  wear  four 
shirts  and  three  jerseys  at  the  same  time. 
The  British  soldier — it  is  one  of  his  char- 
acteristics— puts  on  all  the  clothes  he  can 
get  in  any  weather. 


92  LEISURE   HOURS 

The  voice  at  the  other  end  of  the  wire 
swore — unnecessarily,  I  think.  Then  it  told 
me  that  one  of  the  shirts  was  marked  with 
my  name  and  that  I  must  identify  it  and 
the  man.  I  refused,  of  course.  The  voice 
offered  to  send  the  shirt  round  for  my  in- 
spection. I  did  not  in  the  least  want  to 
inspect  a  shirt  that  had  been  worn,  probably 
for  a  long  time  without  washing,  along  with 
six  other  thick  garments  by  a  deserter ;  but 
I  consented  to  look  at  the  thing  from  a 
distance. 

In  the  end  I  did  not  even  do  that.  The 
unfortunate  man  confessed  to  having  stolen 
the  shirt  from  an  officer  in  the  trenches 
near  Ypres.  How  it  came  to  have  my 
name  on  it  I  do  not  yet  know.  I  did  miss 
a  couple  of  shirts  from  my  store  of  civilian 
clothes  when  I  got  home.  But  I  am  sure 
no  officer  stole  them.  Indeed  I  do  not  see 
how  any  officer  could. 

That  voice — I  do  not  know  that  I  ever 
met  its  owner — had  a  wonderful  power  of 
language,  strong,  picturesque,  and  highly 
profane  language,  suitable  for  expressing 
violent  emotion  over  a  telephone  wire.  It 
was  once  rebuked  by  a  very  gentle  captain 
with  a  remark  that  was  widely  quoted 
afterwards.  The  language  had  been  un- 


LEISURE   HOURS  93 

usually  flamboyant  and  was  becoming  worse. 
"  Hold  on  a  minute,"  said  the  listener, 
"  and  let  the  line  cool.  It's  nearly  red  hot 
at  this  end." 

When  life  failed  to  provide  a  joke  or  two 
we  fell  back  on  rumours  and  enjoyed  them 
thoroughly.  They  say  that  Fleet  Street  as 
a  breeding-ground  for  rumour  is  surpassed 
only  by  the  drawing-rooms  of  the  wives  of 
ministers  of  state.  I  have  no  experience 
of  either  ;  but  a  base  camp  in  France  would 
be  hard  to  beat.  The  number  of  naval 
battles  declared  by  the  best  authorities  to 
have  been  fought  during  the  early  months 
of  1916  was  amazing.  We  had  them  once 
a  week,  and  torpedo-boat  skirmishes  on  off 
days. 

Men  in  "  the  signals  " — all  rumour  goes 
back  to  the  signals  in  the  end — had  lively 
imaginations.  We  mourned  the  loss  of  Kut 
months  before  General  Townshend  was  forced 
to  surrender.  We  revelled  in  extracts  from 
the  private  letters  of  people  like  the  Brazilian 
ambassador  in  Berlin.  We  knew  with  abso- 
lute certainty  the  English  regiments  which 
were  taking  part  in  the  defence  of  Verdun. 
The  Guards,  by  a  sudden  move,  seized  the 
city  of  Lille,  but  owing  to  faulty  staff  work 
were  cut  off,  hemmed  in,  and  at  last  wiped 


94  LEISURE   HOURS 

out,  the  entire  division.  The  last  men,  a 
mixed  batch  of  Grenadiers,  Coldstream, 
Scots,  Irish,  and  Welsh,  perished  in  a  final 
glorious  bayonet  charge.  It  was  a  Guards- 
man who  told  me  the  story  first,  and  he  had 
it  from  what  really  was  unimpeachable 
authority. 

But  there  is  no  reason  for  railing  against 
Rumour.  She  is  a  wild-eyed  jade,  no  doubt, 
with  disordered  locks  and  a  babbling  tongue. 
But  life  at  a  base  in  France  would  be  duller 
without  her ;  and  she  does  no  one  any  real 
harm. 


CHAPTER    VII 

COMING   AND    GOING 

THE  camp  in  which  I  lived  was  the  first  in 
the  series  of  camps  which  stretched  along 
the  whole  winding  valley.  We  were  nearest 
to  the  entrance  gates,  at  which  military 
police  were  perpetually  on  guard;  nearest 
to  the  railway  station,  a  wayside  halte  where 
few  trains  stopped ;  nearest  to  the  road  along 
which  the  trams  ran  into  the  town.  All 
who  came  and  went  in  and  out  passed  by  our 
camp,  using  a  road,  made,  I  think,  by  our 
men  originally,  which  ran  along  the  bottom 
of  our  parade  ground  and  thence,  with  many 
side  roads  branching  from  it,  through  all 
the  camps  right  along  the  valley.  Our 
parade  ground  sloped  down  towards  this 
road,  ending  in  a  steep  bank  which  we  tried 
to  keep  pleasantly  grassy,  which  we  crowned 
with  flower-beds,  so  that  new-comers  might 
feel  that  they  had  arrived  at  a  pleasant 
place. 

96 


96  COMING   AND   GOING 

Standing  on  this  bank  it  was  possible  to 
watch  all  the  entering  and  departing  traffic 
of  the  camps,  the  motor  lorries  which 
rumbled  by,  the  little  road  engines,  always 
somewhat  comic,  which  puffed  and  snorted, 
dragging  trucks  after  them.  Now  and  then 
came  the  motors  of  generals  and  other 
potentates,  or  the  shabby,  overworked  Fords 
of  the  Y.M.C.A.  Mounted  officers,  colonels, 
and  camp  commandants  who  were  privileged 
to  keep  horses,  trotted  by.  Orderlies  on 
bicycles  went  perilously,  for  the  road  was 
narrow  and  motor  lorries  are  big.  A  con- 
stant stream  of  officers  and  men  passed  by  ; 
or  parties,  on  their  way  up  the  hill,  to  one 
of  the  instruction  camps  marched  along. 

This  went  on  all  day  from  early  dawn  till 
the  "  Last  Post "  sounded  and  quiet  came. 
To  a  new-comer,  as  I  was,  one  unused  to 
armies  and  their  ways,  this  traffic  was  a 
source  of  endless  interest ;  but  I  liked  most 
to  stand  on  the  bank  above  the  road  during 
the  later  hours  of  the  forenoon.  It  was 
then  that  the  new  drafts,  men  fresh  from 
England,  marched  in. 

The  transports  whichbrought  them  reached 
the  harbour  early  in  the  morning.  The  men 
disembarked  at  8  a.m.  and  marched  out  to 
the  camps,  a  distance  of  four  or  five  miles. 


COMING   AND  GOING  97 

They  were  often  weary  when  they  arrived, 
wet  and  muddy  perhaps,  or  powdered  with 
dust,  unshaved,  unwashed.  Often  their 
faces  were  still  pallid  after  a  long  night  of 
sea-sickness.  Their  rifles  and  kit  seemed 
a  burden  to  some  of  them.  They  marched 
past  our  camp,  and  there  were  generally  two 
or  three  of  us  who  stood  on  the  bank  to 
watch  and  criticise. 

Later  on,  when  some  of  the  camps  had 
dealt  with  the  music  question,  a  band  or  a 
couple  of  pipers  would  go  some  distance 
along  the  road  to  meet  the  coming  men  and 
to  play  them  into  camp.  Then,  in  spite  of 
weariness  and  the  effects  of  sea-sickness, 
the  new  drafts  stepped  out  bravely  and 
made  a  good  show. 

I  had  a  friend,  a  sergeant  who  had  seen 
much  service,  one  of  those  N.C.O.'s  of  the 
old  army  to  whom  the  empire  owes  a  debt 
which  will  never  be  properly  understood. 
He  often  stood  beside  me  to  watch  the  new 
men  come  in.  He  taught  me  to  criticise 
their  marching,  to  appreciate  their  bearing. 
He  wore  a  South  African  ribbon  then.  He 
wears  the  Mons  ribbon  now  and  a  couple 
of  gold  wound  stripes  and  doubtless  several 
chevrons,  red  and  blue. 

The  skirl  of  pipes  came  to  us,  and  a 
7 


98  COMING  AND   GOING 

moment  later  the  quick,  firm  tread  of  men 
marching. 

"  Guards,  sir,"  said  my  friend. 

They  passed,  swinging  along,  a  mixed 
draft  of  Grenadiers,  Coldstream,  Scots, 
Irish,  Welsh.  My  friend  straightened  him- 
self as  they  went  by. 

"  The  Guards,  sir,  is  the  Guards,  wherever 
they  are." 

He  was  not  himself  a  guardsman,  but 
there  was  no  trace  of  jealousy  in  his  voice. 
I  have  noticed  the  same  thing  again  and 
again.  There  are  people  who  dislike  the 
Guards,  accusing  them  of  conceit  or  resent- 
ing certain  privileges.  I  never  met  any 
one  who  refused  to  give  the  Guards  first 
place  in  battle,  on  the  march,  in  camp.  It 
is  a  magnificent  record  to  have  established 
in  an  army  like  ours,  a  wonderful  record  to 
have  kept  through  a  long-drawn  war  like 
this,  when  every  regiment  has  been  destroyed 
and  remade  of  new  material  half  a  dozen 
times. 

Another  draft  came  by. 

'  Territorials,  sir." 

My  friend  was  prejudiced ;  but  he  is  not 
the  only  soldier  of  the  old  army  who  is 
prejudiced  against  territorials.  Against  new 
battalions,  Kitchener  battalions,  of  regular 


COMING   AND   GOING  99 

regiments  there  is  no  feeling.  The  old  army 
took  them  to  its  heart,  bullied  them,  taught 
them  as  if  they  were  younger  brothers.  The 
Territorials  are  step-brothers  at  best.  Yet 
they  have  made  good  in  France.  I  wonder 
that  the  prejudice  persists.  They  do  not 
march  like  the  Guards.  Even  the  London 
Territorials  have  not  accomplished  that. 
But  they  have  established  themselves  as 
fighters,  in  the  desperate  holding  of  the  Ypres 
salient  in  earlier  days,  and  ever  since  every- 
where in  the  long  battle-line. 

"  R.F.A.,"  said  my  friend,  "  and  the 
biggest  draft  of  the  lot.  There  must  be  a 
damned  lot  of  guns  at  the  front  now.  We 
could  have  done  with  a  few  more  at  Mons. 
It's  guns  that's  wanted  in  this  war.  Guns 
and  men  behind  them.  And  it's  guns,  and 
gunners  anyway,  we're  getting.  Look  at 
those  fellows  now.  You'll  see  worse  drafts  ; 
though  " — he  surveyed  the  men  carefully 
— "  you  might  see  better.  There's  some  of 
them  now  that's  young,  too  young.  They'll 
be  sent  back  sick  before  they  harden.  Beg 
pardon,  sir,  but  here's  our  lot  at  last.  I 
must  be  going." 

He  saluted  and  turned.  A  body  of  men 
with  an  elderly  officer  at  their  head  followed 
the  gunners  closely.  They  turned  sharp  to 


100  COMING  AND  GOING 

the  left  up  the  steep  little  road  which  leads 
into  our  camp.  They  halted  in  the  middle 
of  the  parade  ground.  Salutes  were  given 
and  returned.  The  draft  was  handed  over. 
The  elderly  officer  detached  himself  and 
made  his  way  to  the  mess-room.  I  followed 
to  greet  him,  and  to  hear  the  latest  news 
from  England. 

44  What  sort  of  a  passage  ?  " 

44  Vile.  We  crossed  in  a  superannuated 
paddle-boat.  Everybody  sick.  Not  a  spot 
to  lie  down  in.  My  men  were  detailed  to 
clean  up  the  blessed  packet  afterwards. 
That's  why  we're  late.  Such  a  scene.  Ugh  ! 
Can  I  get  a  drink  ?  " 

I  do  not  know  any  one  who  has  a  more 
consistently  disagreeable  job  than  a  draft- 
conducting  officer.  He  crosses  and  recrosses 
the  Channel  under  the  most  uncomfortable 
conditions  possible.  He  has  a  lot  of  re- 
sponsibility. He  gets  no  praise  and  little 
credit.  He  is  generally  an  elderly  man.  He 
has,  most  likely,  been  accustomed  for  years 
to  an  easy  life.  He  is  often  an  incurable 
victim  to  sea-sickness.  There  is  no  interest 
and  no  excitement  about  his  work.  He 
lives  for  the  most  part  in  trains  and  steamers. 
He  snatches  meals  in  strange  messes,  railway 
refreshment  rooms,  and  quayside  restaurants. 


COMING  AND   GOING  101 

He  may  have  to  conduct  his  draft  all  the 
way  from  Cork  or  Wick.  He  may  be  kept 
waiting  hour  after  hour  for  a  train.  He 
may  be  embarked  and  disembarked  again 
three  or  four  times  before  his  steamer 
actually  starts.  The  men  of  his  draft  are 
strangers  to  him.  He  does  not  know  whether 
his  sergeants  are  trustworthy  or  not.  Yet 
there  is  no  epidemic  of  suicide  among  draft- 
conducting  officers,  though  there  very  well 
might  be.  Great  and  unconquerable  is  the 
spirit  of  the  British  dug-out  officer. 

The  draft  itself  may  have  had  a  bad 
time  too,  especially  in  the  matter  of  cleaning 
up  the  ship  ;  but  then  the  draft  does  not 
have  it  once  a  week.  And  the  draft  has  not 
got  to  turn  round  and  go  straight  back 
again.  And  for  the  draft  the  business  has 
the  advantage  of  novelty.  It  is  excit- 
ing to  land  for  the  first  time  in  France, 
to  be  pursued  by  little  boys  who  say 
**  Souvenir  !  "  and  "  Good  night!  "  early  in 
the  morning.  And  there  is  something  about 
getting  there  at  last,  after  months  of  weary 
training,  which  must  stir  the  most  sluggish 
imagination. 

The  draft  is  examined  by  the  doctors. 
One  way  and  another  a  doctor  in  a  base 
camp  has  a  busy  time  of  it.  He  begins  at 


102  COMING   AND   GOING 

0  a.m.,  diagnosing  the  cases  of  the  men  who 
report  sick.  The  hour  at  which  it  is  possible 
to  report  sick  is  fixed  inconveniently  early 
in  order,  it  is  hoped,  to  discourage  disease. 
Men  who  are  not  very  bad  may  actually 
prefer  the  usual  parades  and  fatigues  to 
reporting  sick  at  6  a.m.  For  sickness  is  not 
even  a  sure  way  of  escape.  Doctors  have 
a  nasty  trick  of  awarding  "  medicine  and 
duty  "  in  doubtful  cases,  which  is  distinctly 
more  unpleasant  than  duty  without  medicine. 
From  that  on  the  doctor  is  kept  busy,  till 
he  drops  off  to  sleep  for  half  an  hour  before 
dinner  in  the  mess-room. 

I  thought  at  first  that  the  doctors  might 
have  been  spared  the  task  of  examining 
incoming  drafts.  The  men  have  all  been 
passed  fit  at  home  before  they  start,  and  it 
does  not  seem  reasonable  to  suppose  that 
their  constitutions  have  seriously  deterior- 
ated on  the  journey.  But  the  new  examina- 
tion is  really  necessary.  Doctors,  according 
to  the  proverb,  differ.  They  even  seem  to 
differ  more  widely  than  other  men.  The 
home  doctor  for  some  reason  takes  an 
optimistic  view  of  human  ailments,  and  is 
inclined  to  pass  a  man  fit  who  will  certainly 
collapse  when  he  gets  up  the  line.  The 
doctor  in  the  base  camp  knows  that  he  will 


COMING   AND  GOING  103 

be  abominably  "  strafed "  if  he  sends 
"  crocks  "  to  the  front.  He  does  not  want 
them  returned  and  left  on  his  hands  at  the 
base.  So  he  picks  the  plainly  unfit  men  out 
of  the  drafts,  and,  after  a  tedious  round  of 
form  filling,  sends  them  back  to  England. 

There  was,  for  instance,  Private  Buggins, 
whose  case  interested  me  so  much  that  I 
should  like  very  much  to  hear  the  end  of 
his  story.  Private  Buggins  suffered  from 
curvature  of  the  spine.  It  was  plain  that 
he  could  not  carry  a  pack  for  very  long. 
Some  one  at  home  passed  Private  Buggins 
fit  and  he  came  out  with  a  draft.  He  was 
picked  out  of  that  draft  at  the  base  in  France. 
At  the  end  of  a  fortnight's  strenuous  labour 
(form  filling),  Private  Buggins  was  sent  back 
to  England. 

A  fortnight  after  that  he  turned  up  again 
in  France,  one  of  another  draft.  Once  more 
he  was  detached.  Once  more  the  wheels 
creaked  round  and  Private  Buggins  went 
back  to  England.  This  time  three  weeks 
elapsed  before  he  joined  another  draft  and 
again  submitted  himself  for  medical  examina- 
tion in  France.  The  result  was  the  same. 
I  do  not  wonder.  I  saw  Buggins's  spine 
once,  and  I  hold  strongly  that  "  Blighty 
is  the  place  for  him." 


104  COMING  AND  GOING 

After  that  I  lost  sight  of  Private  Buggins, 
for  I  was  moved  to  a  new  camp  ;  but  I 
have  no  reason  to  suppose  the  case  is  settled. 
He  is  still,  in  all  probability,  crossing  and 
recrossing  the  English  Channel.  By  this 
time  I  expect  he  has  found  out  ways  of 
living  tolerably  comfortably  under  the  con- 
ditions of  his  nomadic  military  service. 
But  he  ought  to  be  given  a  special  medal 
when  the  war  is  over  and  he  is  allowed  to 
settle  down  again  somewhere. 

A  new  draft  also  submits  to  kit  inspection. 
I  suppose  kits  are  inspected  in  England 
before  the  start  is  made ;  but  the  British 
soldier  has  an  amazing  desire  to  get  rid  of 
the  parts  of  his  equipment  which  strike  him 
as  superfluous.  He  appears  to  shed  kit  as 
he  goes  along,  and  often  succeeds  in  arriving 
at  the  end  of  the  journey  with  only  half  the 
things  he  ought  to  have. 

Yet  he  goes  to  war  with  few  possessions. 
I  am  sure  his  pack  is  heavy  enough  to  carry, 
but  its  contents  look  pitifully  insufficient 
when  spread  out  on  a  parade  ground  for 
inspection.  A  cake  of  soap,  a  razor,  a  small 
towel,  two  or  three  brushes,  a  spare  pair  of 
socks,  a  clean  shirt — it  seems  little  enough  for 
a  man  to  face  an  unknown  world  with,  a  man 
who  is  heir  to  the  gifts  of  a  complex  civilisation. 


COMING  AND   GOING  105 

Once  thoroughly  inspected,  the  draft 
ceases  to  be  a  draft,  and  is  merged  in  the 
camp.  The  men  settle  down  in  the  lines 
of  their  battalion,  take  their  share  in  the 
life  and  work  of  their  fellows  until  the  day 
comes  when  they  are  joined  to  another  draft 
and  sent  forth  on  a  yet  more  adventurous 
journey. 

Drafts  coming  to  us  from  England  arrived 
in  the  morning.  Drafts  going  from  us  to 
the  front  departed  at  night.  I  suppose 
the  numbers  of  those  who  came  and  of  those 
who  went  balanced  like  the  figures  in  a  well- 
kept  ledger.  To  me  it  always  seemed  that 
there  were  more  going  than  coming — an 
illusion  certainly,  since  our  camp  never 
emptied.  But  those  who  came  were  all 
strangers,  while  many  of  those  who  went 
were  friends,  and  many  more  were  acquaint- 
ances. Therefore,  the  going  left  gaps  which 
the  new-comers  did  not  seem  to  fill. 

The  orders  that  a  draft  was  to  go  to  the 
front  came  to  us  in  the  morning  from  the 
Officer  Commanding  Reinforcements.  So 
many  officers  and  men  of  such-and-such  a 
battalion  were  to  proceed  to  such-or-such 
a  place.  Lists,  nominal  rolls,  were  prepared 
in  the  orderly-room.  The  men  were  warned. 
The  officers  rushed  into  town  to  complete 


106  COMING   AND   GOING 

their  kit  or  add  to  it  small  articles  likely  to 
be  useful.  Trench  boots,  trench  coats,  tins 
of  solidified  methylated  spirits,  all  sorts  of 
odds  and  ends,  were  picked  up  at  the  ordnance 
stores  or  at  French  shops  which  dealt  specially 
in  such  things.  Advice  was  eagerly  sought 
— and  the  most  curious  advice  taken — by 
those  who  had  never  been  up  the  line  before. 
That  last  day  at  the  base  was  busy  and 
exciting.  There  was  a  spirit  of  light- 
heartedness  and  gaiety  abroad.  We  laughed 
more  than  usual  and  joked  oftener.  Behind 
the  laughter — who  knows  ? 

In  the  camp  there  was  much  going  to  and 
fro.  Men  stood  in  queues  outside  the 
quartermaster's  stores,  to  receive  gas  masks, 
first  field  dressings,  identification  discs,  and 
such  things.  Kits  were  once  more  inspected, 
minutely  and  rigorously.  Missing  articles 
were  supplied.  Entries  were  made  in  pay 
books. 

Later  on  the  men  crowded  into  the  can- 
teen or  the  Y.M.C.A.  hut.  Letters  were 
written,  pathetic  scrawls  many  of  them. 
There  was  a  feeling  of  excitement,  tense 
and  only  half  suppressed,  among  the  men 
who  were  going.  There  was  no  sign  of 
depression  or  fear ;  certainly  no  hint  of 
any  sadness  of  farewell. 


COMING  AND   GOING  107 

For  us  who  stayed  behind  it  was  different. 
I  saw  scores  of  these  drafts  depart  for  the 
unknown,  terrible  front.  I  never  got  over 
the  feeling  of  awe.  There  are  certain  scenes 
which  will  abide  in  my  memory  to  the  end 
of  my  life,  which  I  do  not  think  I  can 
possibly  forget  even  afterwards,  when  my 
turn  comes  and  I  join  those  men  who  went 
from  us,  of  whom  we  next  heard  when  their 
names  appeared  in  the  lists  of  killed. 

It  was  my  custom  to  invite  those  who  were 
going  to  "  partake  of  the  most  comfortable 
sacrament  of  the  body  and  blood  of  Christ  " 
before  they  started.  At  first  we  used  to 
meet  in  my  hut ;  but  that  was  too  small  for 
us,  though  only  a  few  from  each  departing 
draft  gathered  there.  Later  on  I  used  a 
room  in  a  neighbouring  house. 

It  was  late  in  the  afternoon,  generally 
6  o'clock,  before  the  officers  and  men 
were  ready  to  come.  The  shadows  had 
gathered.  The  candles  on  my  rude  altar 
shone,  giving  the  little  light  we  needed. 
About  to  face  death  these  boys — to  me  and 
especially  at  that  time  they  all  seemed  boys 
— kneeled  to  salute  their  King  who  rules 
by  virtue  of  a  sacrifice  like  theirs.  They 
took  His  body  and  His  blood,  broken  and 
shed  for  them  whose  bodies  were  also  dedi- 


108  COMING   AND   GOING 

cated,  just  as  His  was,  for  the  saving  of  the 
world.  My  hands  trembled,  stretched  out 
in  benediction  over  the  bowed  young  heads. 
Did  ever  men  do  greater  things  than  these  ? 
Have  any  among  the  martyrs  and  saints  of 
the  church's  calendar  belonged  more  clearly 
to  the  great  fellowship  of  Christs  crucified, 
whose  splendid  destiny  it  is  to  redeem  the 
world  ? 

These  eucharists  are  among  the  scenes 
which  it  is  impossible  ever  to  forget.  There 
are  also  others,  no  less  impressive,  in  the 
recurring  drama  of  the  departing  drafts. 

The  day  closes  early  in  these  great  camps. 
At  half-past  eight  the  recreation  huts  close 
their  doors.  Concerts  and  entertainments 
are  over.  The  men  stream  back  to  their 
tents  along  muddy  roads,  laughing,  chatting, 
singing.  Lights  appear  in  the  tents,  and  a 
glow,  red  or  white,  shines  through  the  canvas. 
One  after  another  these  are  extinguished. 
The  "  Last  Post "  sounds  from  a  dozen 
bugles.  The  multitudinous  noises  of  camp 
life  die  away.  The  rifle-fire  which  has 
crackled  all  day  on  the  ranges  has  long 
ceased.  The  spluttering  of  machine  guns 
in  the  training  camps  vexes  the  ear  no  more. 
The  heavy  explosions  of  shell  testing  are 
over  for  another  day.  Save  for  the  sharp 


COMING  AND   GOING  109 

challenge  of  a  sentry  here  and  there,  and 
the  distant  shriek  of  a  railway  engine,  there 
is  almost  unbroken  silence  for  a  while. 

At  half-past  nine  perhaps,  or  a  little 
later,  men  come  silently  from  the  tents  and 
assemble  on  the  parade  ground.  They  fall 
in,  small  detachments  from  four  or  five 
regiments,  each  forming  its  own  lines  of 
men.  They  carry  rifles.  Their  packs  are 
on  their  backs.  Their  haversacks,  mess 
tins,  and  all  the  kit  of  marching  infantry 
are  strung  round  them.  A  draft  from  this 
camp  and  many  drafts  from  all  this  great 
collection  of  camps  are  going  "  up  the  line  " 
to-night. 

"  Up  the  line."  The  phrase  means  a 
long  railway  journey,  very  many  hours  of 
travelling  perhaps,  for  the  train  moves 
slowly.  The  journey  will  end  where  the 
railway  stops  short  of  the  firing-line,  and 
these  men  will  join  their  comrades,  filling 
the  gaps  in  many  battalions.  Some  of 
them  are  fresh  from  home,  young  soldiers. 
Others,  recovered  from  wounds  or  sickness, 
are  going  back  to  perils  and  hardship  which 
they  already  know.  For  all  of  them  this 
is  the  last  parade  in  safety  for  many  a  long 
day.  Henceforth,  till  the  coming  of  peace 
releases  them,  or  a  wound  sends  them  back 


110  COMING  AND  GOING 

to  rest,  or  death  puts  an  end  to  their  soldier- 
ing, they  will  go  in  peril  day  and  night,  will 
endure  incredible  hardships  constantly. 

They  stand  silent.  At  the  head  of  the 
waiting  columns  are  men  with  lanterns  in 
their  hands,  faint  spots  of  light  in  the  sur- 
rounding gloom.  Down  the  hill  from  his 
quarters  the  colonel  comes.  The  adjutant 
and  the  sergeant-major  leave  the  orderly- 
room.  A  little  group  of  officers  stands  back 
in  the  shadow.  They  are  there  to  see  their 
comrades  off.  A  sharp  order  is  given.  There 
is  a  rattle  of  arms  and  accoutrements.  The 
waiting  men  stand  to  attention.  The  colonel 
makes  his  progress  up  and  down  the  line 
of  men,  taking  a  last  look  at  their  equip- 
ment. An  orderly  carrying  a  lantern  goes 
before  him.  He  inspects  each  man  minutely. 
Now  and  then  he  speaks  a  few  words  in  a 
low  tone.  Otherwise  the  silence  is  com- 
plete. 

The  inspection  is  over  at  last.  He  takes 
his  place  at  the  head  of  the  column.  Certain 
formal  orders  are  read  out  by  the  adjutant. 
There  is  something  about  the  unexpended 
portion  of  the  day's  rations.  There  cannot 
be  much  "  unexpended  "  at  10  o'clock  at 
night ;  but  the  military  machine,  recklessly 
prodigal  of  large  sums  of  money,  is  scrupu- 


COMING  AND  GOING  111 

lously  niggardly  about  trifles.  But  it  does 
not  matter.  No  one  at  the  moment  is 
concerned  about  the  unexpended  portion 
of  his  ration.  There  is  a  stern  injunction 
against  travelling  on  the  roof  of  railway 
carriages.  "  Men,"  the  order  explains, 
"  have  been  killed  owing  to  doing  so."  We 
suppose  vaguely  that  those  men  were  better 
dead.  No  one  in  his  right  senses  would 
willingly  travel  on  the  top  of  a  railway 
carriage  at  dead  of  night  in  a  snowstorm. 
And  as  we  stand  on  the  parade  ground  it 
begins  to  snow.  There  is  much  else,  but 
the  reading  stops  at  last.  The  colonel 
speaks.  He  wishes  all  good  fortune  to 
those  who  go.  He  reminds  them  that  they 
are  the  guardians  of  the  honour  of  famous 
regiments.  He  assures  them  that  the  hearts 
of  those  who  stay  behind  go  with  them.  He 
is  himself  one  of  those  who  stay  behind ; 
but  there  is  something  in  the  way  he  speaks 
which  makes  us  sure  that  he  would  gladly 
go.  He  does  not  say  this.  It  is  not  his 
way  to  talk  heroics.  But  more  certainly 
than  if  he  had  said  the  words  the  men  know 
that  it  is  not  of  his  own  choice  that  he  stays 
behind. 

It  is  my  turn  to  speak,  to  pray.     Surely 
never   to   any   minister   of   God   has   such 


112  COMING  AND  GOING 

opportunity  been  given.  But  what  words 
can  I  find  ?  What  supplication  fits  the 
time  and  place  ?  I  beg  the  men  to  pray, 
to  seek  from  above  courage,  strength, 
patience,  inward  peace.  I  make  my  prayer 
for  them,  that  God  will  lighten  the  surround- 
ing darkness  and  deliver  us  all  from  the 
perils  of  "  this  night."  I  am  feeble,  help- 
less, faithless,  without  vision ;  but  at  least 
I  can  give  the  benediction.  "  The  Peace 

of  God "  Even  war  cannot  take  that 

from  the  heart  of  him  who  has  it. 

From  a  neighbouring  camp  comes  the 
sound  of  men  singing  as  they  tramp  down 
the  muddy  road.  Another  draft  is  on  its 
way.  From  a  camp  still  farther  off  we  hear 
the  skirl  of  bagpipes.  There,  too,  men  have 
said  good-bye  to  security  and  are  on  their 
way.  A  sharp  order  rings  out.  Then  an- 
other. The  men  on  the  parade  ground  spring 
to  attention,  turn,  march. 

They  begin  to  sing  as  they  go.  "  Tip- 
perary,"  in  those  days  was  losing  its  popu- 
larity. "  If  I  were  the  only  boy  in  the 
world  "  had  not  come  to  its  own.  For  the 
moment  "  Irish  eyes  are  smiling  "  is  most 
popular.  It  is  that  or  some  such  song  they 
sing,  refusing  even  then  to  make  obeisance 
to  heroic  sentiment.  The  little  group  of 


COMING  AND  GOING  113 

officers,  the  sergeants,  the  orderlies  with  the 
lanterns,  stand  and  salute  the  columns  as 
they  pass. 

Far  down  the  road  we  hear  a  shouted 
jest,  a  peal  of  laughter,  a  burst  of  song. 

In  what  mood,  with  what  spirit  does  the 
soldier,  the  man  in  the  ranks,  go  forth  into 
the  night  to  his  supremely  great  adventure  ? 
We  do  more  than  guess.  We  know.  We 
chaplains  are  officers,  but  we  are  something 
more  than  officers.  We  are,  or  ought  to  be, 
the  friends  of  men  and  officers  alike.  We 
have  the  chance  of  learning  from  the  men's 
own  lips  what  their  feelings  are.  Hardly 
ever  do  we  get  the  least  suggestion  of  heroic 
resolve  or  hint  of  the  consciousness  of  great 
purpose.  Very  often  we  hear  a  hope  ex- 
pressed— a  hope  which  is  really  a  prayer  for 
God's  blessing.  But  this  is  almost  always 
for  those  left  at  home,  for  wife  and  children, 
parents,  brothers,  friends.  It  is  as  if  they 
and  not  the  men  who  fight  had  dangers  to 
face  and  trials  to  endure. 

From  his  intimate  talk  we  may  guess 
that  the  soldier  thinks  very  little  about 
himself  and  very  much  about  those  he  has 
left  behind.  He  says  little  of  what  his  life 
has  been,  less  still  about  that  to  which 
he  looks  forward.  His  mind  is  altogether 
3 


114  COMING  AND  GOING 

occupied  with  the  little  affairs  of  his  home 
life,  with  the  marriage  of  this  friend,  the 
wages  earned  by  son  or  daughter,  the  thou- 
sand details  of  life  in  some  English  village 
or  some  great  city.  Sometimes  we  hear 
an  expression  of  pleasure  at  the  thought  of 
joining  again  comrades  by  whose  side  the 
writer  has  fought.  Sometimes  an  anticipa- 
tion from  a  young  soldier  of  seeing  in  the 
fighting-line  some  friend  who  has  gone  there 
before  him. 

It  is  not  thus  that  an  imaginative  writer 
would  represent  the  talk  of  soldiers  who  say 
farewell.  I  suppose  that  those  who  speak 
as  these  men  do  are  lovers  of  peace  and 
quiet  ways,  have  no  great  taste  for  adven- 
turing, find  war  not  a  joy  but  a  hard  neces- 
sity. Yet  as  we  know,  as  all  Europe  knows 
now,  there  are  no  better  fighters  in  the  world 
than  these  citizen  soldiers  whose  blood  the 
bugle  stirs  but  sluggishly,  whose  hearts  are 
all  the  time  with  those  whom  they  have  left 
at  English  firesides. 


CHAPTER  VIII 

WOODBINE   HUT 

I  KNEW  many  recreation  huts,  Y.M.C.A. 
huts,  Church  Army  huts,  E.F.  canteens, 
while  I  was  in  France.  I  was  in  and  out  of 
them  at  all  sorts  of  hours.  I  lectured  in 
them,  preached  in  them,  told  stories,  played 
games,  and  spent  in  the  aggregate  many  hours 
listening  to  other  people  singing,  reciting, 
lecturing.  It  was  always  a  pleasure  to  be 
in  these  huts  and  I  liked  every  one  of  them. 
But  I  cherish  specially  tender  recollections 
of  Woodbine  Hut.  It  was  the  first  I  knew, 
the  first  I  ever  entered,  my  earliest  love 
among  huts.  Also  its  name  was  singularly 
attractive.  It  is  not  every  hut  which  has 
a  name.  Many  are  known  simply  by  the 
number  of  the  camp  they  belong  to,  and 
even  those  which  have  names  make,  as  a 
rule,  little  appeal  to  the  imagination.  It 
is  nice  and  loyal  to  call  a  hut  after  a  princess, 
for  instance,  or  by  the  name  of  the  donor, 

115 


116  WOODBINE  HUT 

or  after  some  province  or  district  at  home, 
whose  inhabitants  paid  for  the  hut.  One 
is  no  way  moved  by  such  names. 

But  Woodbine  !     The  name  had  nothing 
whatever  to  do  with  the  soldier's  favourite 
cigarette,    though    that  hut,    or  any  other, 
might   very  well   be   called   after  tobacco. 
I,    a    hardened    smoker,    have    choked    in 
the  atmosphere  of  these  huts  worse  than 
anywhere  else,  even  in  the  cabins  of  small 
yachts  anchored  at  night.    But  cigarettes 
were  not  in  the  mind  of  the  ladies  who  built 
and    named    that    hut.     Afterwards    when 
their  hair  and  clothes  reeked  of  a  parti- 
cularly offensive  kind  of  tobacco,   it  may 
have  occurred  to  them  that  they  were  wiser 
than  they  knew  in  choosing  the  name  Wood- 
bine. 

But  at  first  they  were  not  thinking  of 
tobacco.  They  meant  to  make  a  little 
pun  on  their  own  name  like  the  pun  of  the 
herald  who  gave  "  Ver  non  semper  viret  "  to 
the  Vernons  for  a  motto ;  associating  them- 
selves thus  modestly  and  shyly  with  the 
building  they  had  given,  in  which  they 
served.  Also  they  meant  the  name  to  call 
up  in  the  minds  of  the  soldiers  who  used 
the  hut  all  sorts  of  thoughts  of  home,  of 
English  gardens,  of  old-fashioned  flowers, 


WOODBINE  HUT  117 

of  mothers'  smiles  and  kisses — the  kisses 
perhaps  not  always  mother's.  The  idea  is 
a  pretty  one,  and  the  English  soldier,  like 
most  cheerful  people,  is  a  sentimentalist, 
yet  I  doubt  if  ten  of  the  many  thousands  of 
men  who  used  that  hut  ever  associated  it 
with  honeysuckle. 

When  I  first  saw  "  Woodbine  "  over  the 
door  of  that  hut,  the  name  filled  me  with 
astonishment.  I  knew  of  a  Paradise  Court 
in  a  grimy  city  slum,  and  a  dilapidated  white- 
washed house  on  the  edge  of  a  Connaught 
bog  which  has  somehow  got  itself  called 
Monte  Carlo.  But  these  misfits  of  names 
moved  me  only  to  mirth  mingled  with  a 
certain  sadness.  **  Woodbine "  is  a  sheer 
astonishment.  I  hear  the  word  and  think 
of  the  rustic  arches  in  cottage  gardens,  of 
old  tree  trunks  climbed  over  by  delightful 
flowers.  I  think  of  open  lattice  windows, 
of  sweet  summer  air.  Nothing  in  the  whole 
long  train  of  thought  prepares  me  for  or 
tends  in  any  way  to  suggest  this  Woodbine. 

It  is  a  building.  In  the  language  of  the 
army — the  official  language — it  is  a  hut ; 
but  hardly  more  like  the  hut  of  civil  life 
than  it  is  like  the  flower  from  which  it  takes 
its  name.  The  walls  are  thin  wood.  The 
roof  is  corrugated  iron.  It  contains  two 


118  WOODBINE  HUT 

long,  low  halls.  Glaring  electric  lights  hang 
from  the  rafters.  They  must  glare  if  they 
are  to  shine  at  all,  for  the  air  is  thick  with 
tobacco  smoke. 

Inside  the  halls  are  gathered  hundreds  of 
soldiers.  In  one  corner,  that  which  we  enter 
first,  the  men  are  sitting,  packed  close 
together  at  small  tables.  They  turn  over 
the  pages  of  illustrated  papers.  They  drink 
tea,  cocoa,  and  hot  milk.  They  eat  buns 
and  slices  of  bread-and-butter.  They  write 
those  letters  home  which  express  so  little, 
and  to  those  who  understand  mean  so  much. 
Of  the  letters  written  home  from  camp, 
half  at  least  are  on  paper  which  bear  the 
stamp  of  the  Y.M.C.A. — paper  given  to  all 
who  ask  in  this  hut  and  scores  of  others. 
Reading,  eating,  drinking,  writing,  chatting, 
or  playing  draughts,  everybody  smokes. 
Everybody,  such  is  the  climate,  reeks  with 
damp.  Everybody  is  hot.  The  last  thing 
that  the  air  suggests  to  the  nose  of  one  who 
enters  is  the  smell  of  woodbine. 

In  the  other,  the  inner  hall,  there  are 
more  men,  still  more  closely  packed  together, 
smoking  more  persistently,  and  the  air  is 
even  denser.  Here  no  one  is  eating,  no  one 
reading.  Few  attempt  to  write.  The  even- 
ing entertainment  is  about  to  begin.  On  a 


WOODBINE  HUT  119 

narrow  platform  at  one  end  of  the  hall  is 
the  piano.  A  pianist  has  taken  possession 
of  it.  He  has  been  selected  by  no  one  in 
authority,  elected  by  no  committee.  He 
has  occurred,  emerged  from  the  mass  of 
men ;  by  virtue  of  some  energy  within 
him  has  made  good  his  position  in  front  of 
the  instrument.  He  flogs  the  keys,  and 
above  the  babel  of  talk  sounds  some  rag-tune 
melody,  once  popular,  now  forgotten  or 
despised  at  home.  Here  or  there  a  voice 
takes  up  the  tune  and  sings  or  chants  it. 

The  audience  begin  to  catch  the  spirit  of 
the  entertainment.  Some  one  calls  the  name 
of  Corporal  Smith.  A  man  struggles  to 
his  feet  and  leaps  on  to  the  platform.  He 
is  greeted  with  applauding  cheers.  There 
is  a  short  consultation  between  him  and  the 
pianist.  A  tentative  chord  is  struck.  Cor- 
poral Smith  nods  approval  and  turns  to  the 
audience.  His  song  begins.  If  it  is  the 
kind  of  song  that  has  a  chorus  the  audience 
shouts  it  and  Corporal  Smith  conducts  the 
singing  with  waving  of  his  arms. 

Corporal  Smith  is  a  popular  favourite. 
We  know  his  worth  as  a  singer,  demand  and 
applaud  him.  But  there  are  other  candi- 
dates for  favour.  Before  the  applause  has 
died  away,  while  still  acknowledgments  are 


120  WOODBINE  HUT 

being  bowed,  another  man  takes  his  place 
on  the  platform.  He  is  a  stranger  and  no 
one  knows  what  he  will  sing.  But  the 
pianist  is  a  man  of  genius.  Whisper  to  him 
the  name  of  the  song,  give  even  a  hint  of 
its  nature,  let  him  guess  at  the  kind  of  voice, 
bass,  baritone,  tenor,  and  he  will  vamp  an 
accompaniment.  He  has  his  difficulties.  A 
singer  will  start  at  the  wrong  time,  will  for 
a  whole  verse,  perhaps,  make  noises  in  a 
different  key  ;  the  pianist  never  fails.  Some- 
how, before  very  long,  instrument  and  singer 
get  together — more  or  less. 

There  is  no  dearth  of  singers,  no  bashful 
hanging  back,  no  waiting  for  polite  pressure. 
Every  one  who  can  sing,  or  thinks  he  can, 
is  eager  to  display  his  talent.  There  is 
no  monotony.  A  boisterous  comic  song 
is  succeeded  by  one  about  summer  roses, 
autumn  leaves,  and  the  kiss  of  a  maiden  at 
a  stile.  The  vagaries  of  a  ventriloquist  are 
a  matter  for  roars  of  laughter.  A  song 
about  the  beauties  of  the  rising  moon  pleases 
us  all  equally  well.  An  original  genius 
sings  a  song  of  his  own  composition,  rough- 
hewn  verses  set  to  a  familiar  tune,  about 
the  difficulty  of  obtaining  leave  and  the 
longing  that  is  in  all  our  hearts  for  a  return 
to  "  Blighty,  dear  old  Blighty."  Did  ever 


WOODBINE  HUT  121 

men  before  fix  such  a  name  on  the  country 
for  which  they  fight  ? 

Now  and  again  some  one  comes  forward 
with  a  long  narrative  song,  a  kind  of  ballad 
chanted  to  a  tune  very  difficult  to  catch. 
It  is  about  as  hard  to  keep  track  with  the 
story  as  to  pick  up  the  tune.  Words — better 
singers  fail  in  the  same  way — are  not  easily 
distinguished,  though  the  man  does  his  best, 
clears  his  throat  carefully  between  each 
verse  and  spits  over  the  edge  of  the  platform 
to  improve  his  enunciation.  No  one  objects 
to  that. 

About  manners  and  dress  the  audience 
is  very  little  critical.  But  about  the  merits 
of  the  songs  and  the  singers  the  men  express 
their  opinions  with  the  utmost  frankness. 
The  applause  is  genuine,  and  the  singer  who 
wins  it  is  under  no  doubt  about  its  reality. 
The  song  which  makes  no  appeal  is  simply 
drowned  by  loud  talk,  and  the  unfortunate 
singer  will  crack  his  voice  in  vain  in  an 
endeavour  to  regain  the  attention  he  has 
lost. 

Encores  are  rare,  and  the  men  are  slow  to 
take  them.  There  is  a  man  towards  the 
end  of  the  evening  who  wins  one  unmis- 
takably with  an  inimitable  burlesque  of 
"  Alice,  where  art  thou  ?  "  The  pianist  fails 


122  WOODBINE   HUT 

to  keep  in  touch  with  the  astonishing  vagaries 
of  this  performance,  and  the  singer,  un- 
abashed, finishes  without  accompaniment. 
The  audience  yells  with  delight,  and  con- 
tinues to  yell  till  the  singer  comes  forward 
again.  This  time  he  gives  us  a  song  about 
leaving  home,  a  thing  of  heart-rending 
pathos,  and  we  wail  the  chorus  : 

"  It's  sad  to  give  the  last  hand-shake, 
It's  sad  the  last  long  kiss  to  take. 
It's  sad  to  say  farewell." 

The  entertainment  draws  to  its  close 
about  8  o'clock.  Men  go  to  bed  betimes 
who  know  that  a  bugle  will  sound  the 
reveille  at  5.30  in  the  morning.  The  end 
of  the  entertainment  is  planned  to  allow 
time  for  a  final  cup  of  tea  or  a  glass  of  Hor- 
lick's  Malted  Milk  before  we  go  out  to 
flounder  through  the  mud  to  our  tents. 

This  last  half-hour  is  a  busy  one  for  the 
ladies  behind  the  counter  in  the  outer  hall. 
Long  queues  of  men  stand  waiting  to  be 
served.  Dripping  cups  and  sticky  buns  are 
passed  to  them  with  inconceivable  rapidity. 
The  work  is  done  at  high  pressure,  but  with 
the  tea  and  the  food  the  men  receive  some- 
thing else,  something  they  pay  no  penny 
for,  something  the  value  of  which  to  them 


WOODBINE  HUT  128 

is  above  all  measuring  with  pennies — the 
friendly  smile,  the  kindly  word  of  a  woman. 
We  can  partly  guess  at  what  these  ladies 
have  given  up  at  home  to  do  this  work — 
servile,  sticky,  dull  work — for  men  who  are 
neither  kith  nor  kin  to  them.  No  one  will 
ever  know  the  amount  of  good  they  do ; 
without  praise,  pay,  or  hope  of  honour,  often 
without  thanks.  If  "  the  actions  of  the 
just  smell  sweet  and  blossom,"  surely  these 
deeds  of  love  and  kindness  have  a  fragrance 
of  surpassing  sweetness. 

Perhaps,  after  all,  the  hut  is  well  named 
44  Woodbine,"  and  others  might  be  called 
44  Rose,"  4t  Violet,"  4t  Lily."  The  discerning 
eye  sees  the  flowers  through  the  mist  of 
steaming  tea.  We  catch  the  perfume  while 
we  choke  in  the  reek  of  tobacco  smoke, 
damp  clothes,  and  heated  bodies. 

The  British  part  of  the  war  area  in  France 
is  dotted  over  with  huts  more  or  less  like 
the  "  Woodbine."  They  are  owned,  I  sup- 
pose, certainly  run,  by  half  a  dozen  different 
organisations.  I  understand  that  the  Church 
Army  is  now  very  energetic  in  building  huts, 
but  when  I  first  went  to  France  by  far  the 
greater  part  of  the  work  was  done  by  the 
Y.M.C.A. 

The   idea — the  red  triangle   is  supposed 


124  WOODBINE  HUT 

to  be  symbolical — is  to  minister  to  the  needs 
of  the  three  parts  of  man — body,  mind,  and 
soul.  At  the  bar  which  stands  at  one  end 
of  the  hut  men  buy  food,  drink  (strictly 
non-alcoholic),  and  tobacco.  In  the  body 
of  the  room  men  play  draughts,  chess,  any- 
thing except  cards,  read  papers  and  write 
letters.  Often  there  are  concerts  and  lec- 
tures. Sometimes  there  are  classes  which 
very  few  men  attend.  So  the  mind  is  cared 
for. 

The  atmosphere  is  supposed  to  be  religious, 
and  the  men  recognise  the  fact  by  refraining 
from  the  use  of  their  favourite  words  even 
when  no  lady  worker  is  within  earshot.  The 
talk  in  a  Y.M.C.A.  hut  is  sometimes  loud. 
The  laughter  is  frequent.  But  a  young 
girl  might  walk  about  invisible  among  the 
men  without  hearing  an  expression  which 
would  shock  her,  so  long  as  she  remained 
inside  the  four  walls. 

There  are  also  supposed  to  be  prayers  every 
night  and  there  is  a  voluntary  service,  of  a 
very  free  and  easy  kind,  on  Sunday  evenings. 
Those  evening  prayers,  theoretically  a  beau- 
tiful and  moving  ending  to  the  day's  labour, 
were  practically  a  very  difficult  business. 
I  have  been  in  huts  when  the  first  hint  of 
prayers,  the  production  of  a  bundle  of  hymn- 


WOODBINE  HUT  125 

books,  was  the  signal  for  a  stampede  of  men. 
By  the  time  the  pianist  was  ready  to  play 
the  hut  was  empty,  save  for  two  or  three 
unwilling  victims  who  had  been  cornered 
by  an  energetic  lady. 

In  the  early  days  the  "  leader  "  of  the  hut 
was  generally  a  young  man  of  the  kind  who 
would  join  a  Christian  Association  in  the 
days  before  the  war,  and  the  lady  workers, 
sometimes,  but  not  always,  were  of  the 
same  way  of  thinking.  They  were  desper- 
ately in  earnest  about  prayers  and  deter- 
mined, though  I  think  unfair  ways  were 
adopted,  to  secure  congregations.  A  concert 
drew  a  crowded  audience,  and  it  seemed 
desirable  to  attach  prayers  to  the  last  item 
of  the  performance  so  closely  that  there 
was  no  time  to  escape. 

I  remember  scenes,  not  without  an  element 
of  comedy  in  them,  but  singularly  unedifying. 
A  young  lady,  prettily  dressed  and  pleasant 
to  look  at,  recited  a  poem  about  a  certain 
"  nursie "  who  in  the  course  of  her  pro- 
fessional duties  tended  one  "  Percy."  In 
the  second  verse  nursie  fell  in  love  with 
Percy,  and,  very  properly,  Percy  with  her. 
In  the  third  verse  they  were  married.  In 
the  fourth  verse  we  came  on  nursie  nursing 
(business  here  by  the  reciter  as  if  holding 


126  WOODBINE  HUT 

a  baby)  "  another  little  Percy."  The  audi- 
ence shouts  with  laughter,  yells  applause, 
and  wants  to  encore.  The  hut  leader  seizes 
his  opportunity,  announces  prayers,  and 
the  men,  choking  down  their  giggles  over 
nursie,  find  themselves  singing  "  When  I 
survey  the  wondrous  cross." 

My  own  impression  is  that  prayers  cannot 
with  decency  follow  hard  on  a  Y.M.C.A. 
concert.  The  mind  and  soul  sides  of  the 
red  triangle  seem  to  join  at  an  angle  which 
is  particularly  aggressive.  The  body  side, 
on  the  other  hand,  works  in  comparatively 
comfortably  with  both.  Tea  and  cake  have 
long  had  a  semi-sacramental  value  in  some 
religious  circles,  and  the  steam  of  cocoa  or 
hot  malted  milk  blends  easily  with  the  hot 
air  of  a  "  Nursie — Percy  "  concert  or  the 
serener  atmosphere  of  "  Abide  with  Me." 

Yet  I  am  convinced  that  the  evening- 
prayers  idea  is  a  good  one  and  it  can  be 
worked  successfully  for  the  benefit  of  many 
men.  I  have  seen  the  large  hall  of  one  of 
those  Y.M.C.A.  huts  well  filled  night  after 
night  for  evening  prayers,  and  those  were 
not  only  men  who  remained  in  the  hall 
drinking  tea  or  playing  games,  but  many 
others  who  came  in  specially  for  prayers. 
A  choir  gathered  round  the  piano,  eager  to 


WOODBINE   HUT  127 

sing  the  evening  hymn.  The  hush  during 
the  saying  of  a  few  simple  prayers  was  un- 
mistakably devotional.  It  was  impossible 
to  doubt  that  when  the  benediction  fell  upon 
those  bowed  heads  there  did  abide  some- 
thing of  the  peace  which  passeth  all  under- 
standing and  that  hearts  were  lifted  up  unto 
the  Lord. 

There  was,  unfortunately,  a  certain  amount 
of  jealousy  at  one  time  between  the  Y.M.C.A. 
workers  and  the  recognised  army  chaplains. 
I  think  that  this  is  passing  away.  But 
when  I  first  went  to  France  the  relations 
between  the  two  organisations  in  no  way 
suggested  the  ointment  which  ran  down 
Aaron's  beard  to  the  skirts  of  his  garment, 
the  Psalmist's  symbol  of  the  unity  in  which 
brethren  dwelt  together. 

The  Y.M.C.A.  workers  were  perhaps  a 
little  prickly.  The  men  among  them,  often 
Free  Church  ministers,  seemed  on  the  look- 
out for  the  sort  of  snubs  which  Noncon- 
formists often  receive  from  the  Anglican 
clergy  at  home.  The  chaplains,  especially 
the  Church  of  England  chaplains,  appeared 
to  think  that  they  ought  to  conduct  all 
religious  services  in  the  Y.M.C.A.  huts. 
This  was  unreasonable.  If  the  Church  of 
England  had  been  awake  to  her  opportunity 


128  WOODBINE  HUT 

in  the  early  days  of  the  war  she  could  have 
built  church  huts  all  over  northern  France 
and  run  them  on  her  own  lines.  She  missed 
her  chance,  not  having  among  her  leaders 
any  man  of  the  energy  and  foresight  of 
Sir  A.  Yapp. 

The  Church  Army  has  done  much  during 
the  last  years ;  but  it  has  been  the  making 
up  of  leeway.  The  Church  once  might  have 
occupied  the  position  held  by  the  Y.M.C.A. 
She  failed  to  rise  to  the  occasion.  Her 
officers,  the  military  chaplains,  had  no  fair 
cause  of  complaint  when  they  found  that 
they  could  not  straightway  enter  into  the 
fruits  of  other  men's  labour. 

But  the  little  jealousy  which  existed 
between  the  chaplains  and  the  Y.M.C.A. 
was  passing  away  while  I  was  in  France, 
has  now,  perhaps,  entirely  disappeared. 
The  war  has  done  little  good,  that  I  ever 
could  discover,  to  any  one,  but  it  has 
delivered  the  souls  of  the  Church  of  England 
clergy  who  went  out  to  France  from  the 
worst  form  of  ecclesiastical  snobbery.  There 
are  few  of  those  who  tried  to  work  in  the 
army  who  preserve  the  spirit  of  social 
superiority  which  has  had  a  good  deal  to 
do  with  the  dislike  of  the  Church,  which  has 
been  I  imagine,  a  much  more  effective  cause 


of  "  our  unhappy  divisions  "  than  any  of 
the  doctrines  men  have  professed  to  quarrel 
about. 

And  the  Y.M.C.A.  workers  are  less  ag- 
gressively prickly  than  they  used  to  be. 
The  army  authorities  have  weeded  out  a 
good  many  of  the  original  men  workers, 
young  students  from  Free  Church  theo- 
logical colleges,  and  put  them  into  khaki. 
Their  places  have  been  taken  by  older  men, 
of  much  larger  experience  of  life,  less  keen 
on  making  good  the  position  of  a  particular 
religious  denomination.  They  are  often  glad 
to  hand  over  their  strictly  religious  duties 
to  any  chaplain  who  will  do  them  efficiently. 

The  women  workers,  a  far  more  numerous 
class,  never  were  so  difficult,  from  the 
Church  of  England  chaplain's  point  of  view, 
as  the  men.  They  are,  in  the  fullest  sense, 
voluntary  workers.  They  even  pay  all  their 
own  expense,  lodging,  board,  and  travelling. 
They  must  be  women  of  independent  means. 
I  do  not  know  why  it  is,  but  well-off  people 
are  seldom  as  eager  about  emphasising 
sectarian  differences  as  those  who  have  to 
work  for  small  incomes.  Perhaps  they  have 
more  chance  of  getting  interested  in  other 
things. 

It  is,   I  fear,  true  that  the  decay  of  the 


180  WOODBINE  HUT 

sectarian — that  is  to  say  undenominational 
— spirit  in  the  Y.M.C.A.  has  resulted  in  a 
certain  blurring  of  the  "  soul "  side  of  the 
red  triangle.  This  has  been  a  cause  of 
uneasiness  to  the  society's  authorities  at 
home,  and  various  efforts  have  been  made 
to  stimulate  the  spiritual  work  of  the  huts 
and  to  inquire  into  the  causes  of  its  failure. 
I  am  inclined  to  think  that  the  matter  is 
quite  easily  understood.  There  is  less  ag- 
gressive religiosity  in  Y.M.C.A.  huts  than 
there  used  to  be,  because  the  society  is 
more  and  more  drawing  its  workers  from  a 
class  which  instinctively  shrinks  from  slap- 
ping a  strange  man  heartily  on  the  back 
and  greeting  him  with  the  inquiry — "  Tom- 
my, how's  your  soul  ?  "  There  is  no  need 
for  anxiety  about  the  really  religious  work 
of  the  huts.  That  in  most  places  is  being 
done. 


CHAPTER   IX 
Y.S.C. 

"  Y.S.C."  stands  for  Young  Soldiers'  Club,  an 
institution  which  had  a  short,  but,  I  think, 
really  useful  existence  in  the  large  camp 
where  I  was  first  stationed.  There  were  in 
that  camp  large  numbers  of  boys — at  one 
time  nearly  a  thousand  of  them — all  en- 
listed under  age  in  the  early  days  of  the 
recruiting  movement,  all  of  them  found  by 
actual  trial  or  judged  beforehand  to  be  unfit 
for  the  hardship  of  life  in  the  trenches. 
They  were  either  sent  down  from  their 
battalions  to  the  base  or  were  stopped  on 
the  way  up.  For  some  time  their  number 
steadily  increased.  Like  the  children  of 
Israel  in  Egypt,  who  also  multiplied  rapidly, 
they  became  a  nuisance  to  the  authorities. 

Their  existence  in  the  camp  was  a  standing 
menace  to  discipline.  Officially  they  were 
men  to  be  trained,  fed,  lodged,  if  necessary 
punished  according  to  the  scheme  designed 
for  and  in  the  main  suitable  to  men.  In 

131 


132  Y.S.C. 

reality  they  were  boys,  growing  boys,  some 
of  them  not  sixteen  years  of  age,  a  few — 
the  thing  seems  almost  incredible — not 
fifteen.  How  the  recruiting  authorities  at 
home  ever  managed  to  send  a  child  of  less 
than  fifteen  out  to  France  as  a  fighting  man 
remains  mysterious.  But  they  did. 

These  were  besides  boys  of  a  certain 
particularly  difficult  kind.  It  is  not  your 
"  good  "  boy  who  rushes  to  the  recruiting 
office  and  tells  a  lie  about  his  age.  It  is 
not  the  gentle,  amiable,  well-mannered  boy 
who  is  so  enthusiastic  for  adventure  that 
he  will  leave  his  home  and  endure  the 
hardships  of  a  soldier's  life  for  the  sake  of 
seeing  fighting.  These  boys  were  for  the 
most  part  young  scamps,  and  some  of  them 
had  all  the  qualities  of  the  guttersnipe,  but 
they  had  the  makings  of  men  in  them  if 
properly  treated. 

The  difficulty  was  to  know  how  to  treat 
them.  No  humane  C.O.  wants  to  condemn 
a  mischievous  brat  of  a  boy  to  Field  Punish- 
ment No.  1.  Most  C.O.'s.,  even  most  ser- 
geants, know  that  punishment  of  that  kind, 
however  necessary  for  a  hardened  evildoer 
of  mature  years,  is  totally  unsuitable  for  a 
boy.  At  the  same  time  if  any  sort  of  dis- 
cipline is  to  be  preserved,  a  boy,  who  must 


Y.S.C.  133 

officially  be  regarded  as  a  man,  cannot  be 
allowed  to  cheek  a  sergeant  or  flatly  to 
refuse  to  obey  orders.  That  was  the  military 
difficulty. 

The  social  and  moral  difficulty  was,  if 
anything,  worse.  Those  boys  were  totally 
useless  to  the  army  where  they  were,  stuck 
in  a  large  camp.  They  were  learning  all 
sorts  of  evil  and  very  little  good.  They 
were  a  nuisance  to  the  N.C.O.'s  and  men, 
among  whom  they  lived,  and  were  bullied 
accordingly.  They  were  getting  no  educa- 
tion and  no  suitable  physical  training.  They 
were  in  a  straight  way  to  be  ruined  instead 
of  made. 

It  was  an  Irish  surgeon  who  realised  the 
necessity  for  doing  something  for  these  boys 
and  set  about  the  task.  I  do  not  suppose 
that  he  wants  his  name  published  or  his 
good  deeds  advertised.  I  shall  call  him  J. 
He  was  a  typical  Irishman — in  looks, 
manner,  and  character  one  of  the  most 
Irishmen  I  have  ever  met.  He  had  a 
wonderful  talent  for  dealing  with  young 
animals.  The  very  first  time  I  met  him  he 
took  me  to  see  a  puppy,  a  large,  rather 
savage-looking  creature  which  he  kept  in  a 
stable  outside  the  camp.  One  of  the  crea- 
ture's four  grandparents  had  been  a  wolf, 


134  Y.S.C. 

J.  hoped  to  make  the  puppy  a  useful  member 
of  society. 

"  I  am  never  happy,"  he  said,  "  unless  I 
have  some  young  thing  to  train — dog,  horse, 
anything.  That's  the  reason  I'm  so  keen 
on  doing  something  for  these  boys." 

J.  had  no  easy  job  when  he  took  up  the 
cause  of  the  boys.  It  was  not  that  he  had 
to  struggle  against  active  opposition.  There 
was  no  active  opposition.  Every  one  wanted 
to  help.  The  authorities  realised  that  some- 
thing ought  to  be  done.  What  J.  was  up 
against  was  system,  the  fact  that  he  and 
the  boys  and  the  authorities  and  every  one 
of  us  were  parts  of  a  machine  and  the  wheels 
of  the  thing  would  only  go  round  one  way. 

Trying  to  get  anything  of  an  exceptional 
kind  done  in  the  army  is  like  floundering  in 
a  trench  full  of  sticky  mud — one  is  inclined 
sometimes  to  say  sticky  muddle — surrounded 
by  dense  entanglements  of  barbed  red-tape. 
You  track  authority  from  place  to  place, 
finding  always  that  the  man  you  want,  the 
ultimate  person  who  can  actually  give  the 
permission  you  require,  lies  just  beyond. 
If  you  are  enormously  persevering,  and, 
nose  to  scent,  you  hunt  on  for  years,  you 
find  yourself  at  last  back  with  the  man 
from  whom  you  started,  having  made  a  full 


Y.S.C.  135 

circle  of  all  the  authorities  there  are.     Then, 
if  you  like,  you  can  start  again. 

I  do  not  know  how  J.  managed  the  early 
stages  of  the  business.  He  had  made  a 
good  start  long  before  I  joined  him.  But 
only  an  Irishman,  I  think,  could  have  done 
the  thing  at  all.  Only  an  Irishman  is 
profane  enough  to  mock  at  the  great  god 
System,  the  golden  image  before  which  we 
are  all  bidden  to  fall  down  and  worship 
"  what  time  we  hear  the  sound  of"  military 
music.  Only  an  Irishman  will  venture  light- 
heartedly  to  take  short  cuts  through  regula- 
tions. It  is  our  capacity  for  doing  things 
the  wrong  way  which  makes  us  valuable 
to  the  Empire,  and  they  ought  to  decorate 
us  oftener  than  they  do  for  our  insubordina- 
tion. 

There  was  an  Irishman,  so  I  am  told,  in 
the  very  early  days  of  the  war  who  created 
hospital  trains  for  our  wounded  by  going 
about  the  French  railways  at  night  with  an 
engine  and  seizing  waggons,  one  at  this 
station,  one  at  that.  He  bribed  the  French 
station  masters  who  happened  to  be  awake. 
It  was  a  lawless  proceeding,  but,  thanks 
to  him,  there  were  hospital  trains.  An 
Englishman  would  have  written  letters  about 
the  pressing  need  and  there  would  not  have 


136  Y.S.C. 

been  hospital  trains  for  a  long  time.  J. 
did  nothing  like  that.  There  was  no  need 
for  such  violence.  Both  he  and  the  boys 
had  good  friends.  Every  one  wanted  to 
help,  and  in  the  end  something  got  done. 

A  scheme  of  physical  training  was  ar- 
ranged for  the  boys  and  they  were  placed 
under  the  charge  of  special  sergeants.  Their 
names  were  registered.  I  think  they  were 
"  plotted "  into  a  diagram  and  exhibited 
in  curves,  which  was  not  much  use  to  them, 
but  helped  to  soothe  the  nerves  of  authorities. 
To  the  official  mind  anything  is  hallowed 
when  it  is  reduced  to  curves.  The  boys 
underwent  special  medical  examinations, 
were  weighed  and  tested  at  regular  intervals. 
Finally  a  club  was  established  for  them. 

At  that  point  the  Y.M.C.A.  came  to  our 
aid.  It  gave  us  the  use  of  one  of  the  best 
buildings  in  the  camp,  originally  meant 
for  an  officers'  club.  It  was  generous  beyond 
hope.  The  house  was  lighted,  heated,  fur- 
nished, in  many  ways  transformed,  at  the 
expense  of  the  Y.M.C.A.  We  were  supplied 
with  a  magic-lantern,  books,  games,  boxing 
gloves,  a  piano,  writing-paper,  everything 
we  dared  to  ask  for.  Without  the  help  of 
the  Y.M.C.A.  that  club  could  never  have 
come  into  existence.  And  the  association 


Y.S.C.  137 

deserves  credit  not  only  for  generosity  in 
material  things,  but  for  its  liberal  spirit. 
The  club  was  not  run  according  to  Y.M.C.A. 
rules,  and  was  an  embarrassing  changeling 
child  in  their  nursery,  just  as  it  was  a  sus- 
picious innovation  under  the  military 
system. 

We  held  an  opening  meeting,  and  the 
colonel — one  of  our  most  helpful  friends- 
agreed  to  give  the  boys  an  address.  I  wonder 
if  any  other  club  opened  quite  as  that  one. 
In  our  eagerness  to  get  to  work  we  took 
possession  of  our  club  house  before  it  was 
ready  for  us.  There  was  no  light.  There 
was  almost  no  furniture.  There  was  no 
organisation.  We  had  very  little  in  the 
way  of  settled  plan.  But  we  had  boys, 
eight  or  nine  hundred  of  them,  about  double 
as  many  as  the  largest  room  in  the  building 
would  hold. 

They  were  marched  down  from  their 
various  camps  by  sergeants.  For  the  most 
part  they  arrived  about  an  hour  before  the 
proper  time.  The  sergeants,  quite  reason- 
ably, considered  that  their  responsibility 
ended  when  the  boys  passed  through  the 
doors  of  the  club.  The  boys  took  the  view 
that  at  that  moment  their  opportunity 
began. 


138  Y.S.C. 

They  rioted.  Every  window  in  the  place 
was  shattered.  Everything  else  breakable 
—fortunately  there  was  not  much — was 
smashed  into  small  bits.  A  Y.M.C.A.  worker, 
a  young  man  lent  to  us  for  the  occasion, 
and  recommended  as  experienced  with  boys' 
clubs  in  London,  fled  to  a  small  room  and 
locked  himself  in.  The  tumult  became  so 
terrific  that  an  officer  of  high  standing  and 
importance,  whose  office  was  in  the  neigh- 
bourhood, sent  an  orderly  to  us  with  threats. 
It  was  one  of  the  occasions  on  which  it  is 
good  to  be  an  Irishman.  We  have  been 
accustomed  to  riots  all  our  lives,  and  mind 
them  less  than  most  other  people.  We 
know — this  is  a  fact  which  Englishmen  find 
it  difficult  to  grasp — that  cheerful  rioters 
seldom  mean  to  do  any  serious  mischief. 

Yet,  I  think,  even  J.'s  heart  must  have 
failed  him  a  little.  Very  soon  the  colonel, 
who  was  to  open  the  club  with  his  address, 
would  arrive.  He  was  the  best  and  staunch- 
est  of  friends.  He  had  fought  battles  for 
the  club  and  patiently  combated  the  ob- 
jections in  high  quarters.  But  he  did  like 
order  and  discipline. 

It  was  one  of  our  fixed  principles,  about 
the  only  fixed  principle  we  had  at  first,  that 
the  club  was  to  be  run  by  moral  influence, 


Y.S.C.  139 

not  by  means  of  orders  and  threats.  Our 
loyalty  to  principle  was  never  more  highly 
tried.  It  seems  almost  impossible  to  bring 
moral  influence  to  bear  effectively  when  you 
cannot  make  yourself  heard  and  cannot 
move  about.  Yet,  somehow,  a  kind  of 
order  was  restored ;  and  there  was  no 
uncertainty  about  the  cheers  with  which 
the  colonel  was  greeted  when  he  entered  the 
room.  The  boys  in  the  other  rooms  who 
could  not  see  him  cheered  frantically.  The 
boys  on  the  balcony,  the  boys  standing  in 
the  window  frames,  all  cheered.  They 
asked  nothing  better  than  to  be  allowed  to 
go  on  cheering. 

With  the  colonel  were  one  or  two  other 
officers,  our  benefactor,  the  local  head  of 
the  Y.M.C.A.,  and  a  solitary  lady,  Miss  N. 
I  do  not  know  even  now  how  she  got  there 
or  why  she  came,  but  she  was  not  half  an 
hour  in  the  room  before  we  realised  that 
she  was  the  woman,  the  one  woman  in  the 
whole  world,  for  our  job.  Miss  N.  was 
born  to  deal  with  wild  boys.  The  fiercer  they 
are  the  more  she  loves  them,  and  the  wickeder 
they  are  the  more  they  love  her.  We  had 
a  struggle  to  get  Miss  N.  Oddly  enough 
she  did  not  at  first  want  to  come  to  the  club, 
being  at  the  time  deeply  attached  to  some 


140  Y.S.C. 

dock  labourers  among  whom  she  worked 
in  a  slum  near  the  quay.  The  Y.M.C.A.— 
she  belonged  to  them — did  not  want  to  part 
with  her.  But  we  got  her  in  the  end,  and 
she  became  mistress,  mother,  queen  of  the 
club. 

The  colonel's  speech  was  a  success,  a  thing 
which  seemed  beforehand  almost  beyond 
hope.  He  told  those  boys  the  naked  truth 
about  themselves,  what  they  were,  what 
they  had  been,  and  what  they  might  be. 
They  listened  to  him.  I  found  out  later 
on  that  those  boys  would  listen  to  straight 
talk  on  almost  any  subject,  even  them- 
selves. Also  that  they  would  not  listen 
to  speech- making  of  the  ordinary  kind.  I 
sometimes  wonder  what  will  happen  when 
they  become  grown  men  and  acquire  votes. 
How  will  they  deal  with  the  ordinary 
politician  ? 

I  cherish  vivid  recollections  of  the  early 
days  of  the  club.  I  think  of  J.,  patient 
and  smiling,  surrounded  by  a  surging  crowd 
of  boys  all  clamouring  to  talk  to  him  about 
this  or  that  matter  of  deep  interest  to  them. 
J.  had  an  extraordinary  faculty  for  winning 
the  confidence  of  boys. 

There  were  evenings,  before  the  electric 
light  was  installed  and  before  we  had  any 


Y.S.C.  141 

chairs,  when  Miss  N.  sat  on  the  floor  and 
played  draughts  with  boys  by  the  light  of 
a  candle  standing  in  its  own  grease.  I  have 
seen  her  towed  by  the  skirt  through  the 
rooms  of  the  club  by  a  boy  whom  the  others 
called  "  Darkie,"  an  almost  perfect  specimen 
of  the  London  gutter  snipe.  There  was  a 
day  when  her  purse  was  stolen.  But  I  think 
the  rest  of  the  club  would  have  lynched 
the  thief  if  they  could  have  caught  him. 

There  were  wild  boxing  bouts  which  went 
on  in  pitch  darkness,  after  the  combatants 
had  trampled  on  the  candle.  There  was 
one  evening  when  I  came  on  a  boy  lying 
flat  on  his  back  on  the  floor  hammering  the 
keys  of  the  piano,  our  new  piano,  with  the 
heels  of  his  boots.  The  tuner  told  me  after- 
wards that  he  broke  seventeen  strings. 

But  we  settled  down  by  degrees.  We 
had  lectures  every  afternoon  which  were 
supposed  to  be — I  think  actually  were — of 
an  educative  kind.  Attendance  at  these 
lectures  was  compulsory.  The  boys  were 
paraded  and  marched  to  the  club.  As  we 
had  not  space  in  our  lecture  room  for  more 
than  half  our  members,  we  had  one  set  of 
boys  on  Mondays,  Wednesdays,  and  Fridays, 
another  on  Tuesdays,  Thursdays,  and  Satur- 
days. Each  lecturer  delivered  himself  twice. 


142  Y.S.C. 

The  business  of  keeping  up  a  supply  of 
lectures  was  not  so  difficult  as  we  expected. 
Officers  were  very  kind  and  offered  us  the 
most  amazing  collection  of  subjects.  The 
secretary  of  many  a  literary  society  at  home 
would  be  envious  of  our  list.  We  accepted 
every  offer  we  got,  no  matter  how  inappro- 
priate the  subject  seemed  to  be. 

It  was  impossible  to  tell  beforehand  which 
lectures  would  be  popular  and  which  would 
fail.  Military  subjects  were  of  course 
common.  We  had  "  The  Navy "  with 
lantern  slides.  M.  gave  that  lecture,  but 
all  his  best  slides  were  banned  by  the  censor, 
for  fear,  I  suppose,  that  we  might  have  a 
German  spy  among  us  and  that  he  would 
telegraph  to  Berlin  a  description  of  a  light 
cruiser  if  M.  exhibited  one  upon  the  screen. 
We  had  "  Men  who  have  won  the  V.C." 
with  lantern  slides.  That  was,  as  was  ex- 
pected, a  success.  But  we  also  had  "  Napo- 
leon's Campaigns  "  by  a  Cambridge  professor 
of  history,  illustrated  by  nothing  better 
than  a  few  maps  drawn  on  a  blackboard. 
To  our  amazement  that  was  immensely 
popular.  We  had  "  How  an  Army  is  fed," 
by  an  A.S.C.  officer,  the  only  lecture  which 
produced  a  vigorous  discussion  afterwards. 

But  we  did  not  confine  ourselves  to  military 


Y.S.C.  143 

subjects.  We  had  lectures  on  morals,  which 
were  sometimes  a  little  confusing.  One 
lecturer,  I  remember,  starting  from  the 
fact  that  the  boys  had  misstated  their  ages 
to  the  recruiting  officers  when  they  enlisted, 
hammered  home  the  fact  that  all  lies  are 
disgraceful,  and  therefore  our  boys  ought 
to  be  thoroughly  ashamed  of  themselves. 
Another  lecturer,  a  month  later,  starting 
from  the  same  fact,  took  the  line  that  it 
was  possible  to  be  splendide  mendax,  and 
that  we  had  good  reason  to  be  extremely 
proud  all  our  lives  of  the  lie  told  in  the 
recruiting  office. 

Manners  are  more  or  less  connected  with 
morals,  and  we  had  lectures  on  manners; 
that  is  to  say,  on  saluting,  which  is  the 
beginning  and  ending  of  good  manners  in 
the  army.  A  good  many  civilians,  especially 
those  of  the  intellectual  "conchie"  kind, 
are  inclined  to  smile  at  the  importance 
soldiers  attach  to  saluting.  Our  lecturer 
convinced  me — I  hope  he  convinced  the 
rest  of  his  audience — -that  saluting  is  some- 
thing more  than  a  piece  of  tiresome  ritual, 
that  it  is  the  external  expression  of  certain 
very  great  ideas. 

Occasionally,  but  not  often,  we  were  in 
difficulties  about  our  lectures.  Some  one  at 


144  Y.S.C. 

home  sent  us  a  present  of  a  beautiful  set  of 
lantern  slides,  illustrating  a  tour  in  Egypt. 
They  were  such  fine  slides  that  it  seemed  a 
pity  to  waste  them.  But  for  a  long  time 
we  could  not  find  any  one  who  knew  enough 
about  Egypt  to  attempt  a  verbal  accompani- 
ment of  the  slides. 

At  last  we  got  a  volunteer.  He  said 
frankly  that  he  did  not  know  half  the 
places  we  had  pictures  of,  but  offered  to  do 
his  best.  He  did  exceedingly  well  with  the 
places  he  did  know,  making  the  tombs  of 
the  ancient  Pharaohs  quite  interesting  to 
the  boys.  But  he  was  a  conscientious  man. 
He  refused  to  invent  history  to  suit  strange 
pictures.  When  anything  he  did  not  recognise 
was  thrown  on  the  screen  he  dismissed  it 
rapidly.  "  This,"  he  would  say,  "  is  another 
tomb,  probably  of  another  king,"  or  "  This 
is  a  camel  standing  beside  a  ruined  arch- 
way." Every  one  was  thoroughly  satisfied. 

We  had  another  set  of  slides  which  gave 
us  some  trouble,  a  series  of  pictures  of  racing 
yachts  under  sail.  I  had  to  take  those  on 
myself,  and  I  was  rather  nervous.  I  need 
not  have  been.  The  boys  in  that  club  were 
capable  of  taking  an  interest  in  any  subject 
under  the  sun.  Before  I  got  to  the  last 
slide  the  audience  was  ready  to  shout  the 


Y.S.C.  145 

name  of  every  sail  on  a  racing  cutter,  and 
could  tell  without  hesitation  whether  a 
yacht  on  a  run  was  carrying  her  spinnaker 
on  the  port  or  starboard  hand.  They  say 
that  all  knowledge  is  useful.  I  hope  that 
it  is. 

Once  or  twice  a  lecturer  failed  us  at  the 
last  moment  without  giving  us  notice.  Then 
J.  and  I  had  to  run  an  entertainment  of  an 
instructive  kind  extempore.  J.  was  strong 
on  personal  hygiene.  He  might  start  with 
saluting  or  the  theft  of  Miss  N.'s  purse,  our 
great  club  scandal,  but  he  worked  round 
in  the  end  to  soap  and  tooth  brushes.  My 
own  business,  if  we  were  utterly  driven 
against  the  wall,  was  to  tell  stories. 

The  most  remarkable  and  interesting 
lecture  we  ever  had  was  given  on  one  of 
those  emergency  occasions  by  one  of  our 
members.  He  volunteered  an  account  of 
his  experiences  in  the  trenches.  He  cannot 
have  been  much  more  than  seventeen  years 
old,  and  ought  never  to  have  been  in  the 
trenches.  He  was  undersized  and,  I  should 
say,  of  poor  physique.  If  the  proper  use 
of  the  letter  "  h  "  in  conversation  is  any  test 
of  education,  this  boy  must  have  been  very 
little  educated.  His  vocabulary  was  limited, 
and  many  of  the  words  he  did  use  are  not 
10 


U6  Y.S.C. 

to  be  found  in  dictionaries.  But  he  stood 
on  the  platform  and  for  half  an  hour  told 
us  what  he  had  seen,  endured,  and  felt,  with 
a  straightforward  simplicity  which  was  far 
more  effective  than  any  art.  He  disappeared 
from  our  midst  soon  afterwards,  and  I  have 
never  seen  him  since.  I  would  give  a  good 
deal  now  to  have  a  verbatim  report  of  that 
lecture  of  his. 

When  the  lecture  of  the  afternoon  was 
over,  the  club  amused  itself.  Attendance 
was  no  longer  compulsory.  Boys  came  and 
went  as  they  chose.  Order  was  maintained 
and  enforced  by  a  committee  of  the  boys 
themselves.  It  met  once  a  week,  and  of  all 
the  committees  I  have  ever  known  that  one 
was  the  most  rigidly  businesslike.  I  cannot 
imagine  where  the  secretary  gained  his 
experience  of  the  conduct  of  public  business  ; 
but  his  appeals  to  the  chair  when  any  one 
wandered  from  the  subject  under  discussion 
were  always  made  with  reason,  and  he 
understood  the  difference  between  an  amend- 
ment and  a  substantive  resolution. 

The  only  difficulty  we  ever  had  with  that 
committee  arose  from  its  passion  for  making 
rules.  Our  idea  for  the  management  of  the 
club  was  to  have  as  few  rules  as  possible. 
The  committee,  if  unchecked,  would  have 


Y.S.C.  147 

out-Heroded  the  War  Office  itself  in  multi- 
plying regulations.  I  am  inclined  to  think 
that  it  is  a  mistake  to  run  institutions  on 
purely  democratic  lines,  not  because  reason- 
able liberty  would  degenerate  into  licence, 
but  because  there  would  be  no  liberty  at  all. 
If  democracy  ever  comes  to  its  own,  and 
the  will  of  the  people  actually  prevails,  we 
may  all  find  ourselves  so  tied  up  with  laws 
regulating  our  conduct  that  we  will  wish 
ourselves  back  under  the  control  of  a  tyrant. 

It  was  during  those  hours  of  recreation 
that  Miss  N.  reigned  over  the  club.  She 
ran  a  canteen  for  the  boys,  boiling  eggs, 
serving  tea,  cocoa,  malted  milk,  bread-and- 
butter,  and  biscuits.  She  played  games. 
She  started  and  inspired  sing-songs.  She 
listened  with  sympathy  which  was  quite 
unaffected  to  long  tales  of  wrongs  suffered, 
of  woes  and  of  joys.  She  was  never  with- 
out a  crowd  of  boys  round  her,  often  clinging 
to  her,  and  the  offers  of  help  she  received 
must  have  been  embarrassing  to  her. 

Miss  N.  had  a  little  room  of  her  own  in 
the  club.  She  furnished  it  very  prettily, 
and  we  used  to  pretend  to  admire  the  view 
from  the  windows.  Once  we  tried  to  per- 
suade an  artist  who  happened  to  be  in 
camp  to  make  a  sketch  from  that  window. 


148  Y.S.C. 

The  artist  shrank  from  the  task.  The  far 
background  was  well  enough,  trees  on  the 
side  of  a  hill ;  but  the  objects  in  the  middle 
distance  were  a  railway  line  and  a  ditch  full 
of  muddy  water.  In  the  foreground  there 
were  two  incinerators,  a  dump  of  old  tins, 
and  a  Salvation  Army  hut.  I  dare  say  the 
artist  was  right  in  shrinking  from  the 
subject. 

In  that  little  room  of  hers,  Miss  N.  had 
tea  parties  every  day  before  the  afternoon 
lecture.  I  was  often  there.  Sometimes  I 
brought  M.  with  me.  Always  there  were 
boys,  as  many  as  the  room  would  hold,  often 
more  than  it  held  comfortably.  Pain  d'epice 
is  not  my  favourite  food  in  ordinary  life, 
but  I  ate  it  with  delight  in  that  company. 
No  one,  on  this  side  of  the  grave,  will  ever 
know  how  much  Miss  N.  did  for  those  boys 
in  a  hundred  ways.  I  feebly  guess,  because 
I  know  what  her  friendship  meant  to  me. 
I  was,  I  know,  a  trial  to  her.  My  lax  church- 
manship  must  have  shocked  her.  My  want 
of  energy  must  have  annoyed  her.  But  she 
remained  the  most  loyal  of  fellow-workers. 

There  were  breakfast-parties,  as  well  as 
tea-parties,  in  Miss  N.'s  room  on  Sunday 
mornings.  We  had  a  celebration  of  the 
Holv  Communion  at  6  o'clock  and  after- 


Y.S.C.  149 

wards  we  breakfasted  with  Miss  N.  The 
memory  of  one  Sunday  in  particular  remains 
with  me.  On  Easter  Sunday  in  1915  I 
celebrated  on  board  the  Lusitania,  a  little 
way  outside  the  harbour  of  New  York,  the 
congregation  kneeling  among  the  arm-chairs 
and  card-tables  of  the  great  smoke-room 
on  the  upper  deck.  In  1916  I  read  the 
same  office  in  the  class-room  of  the  Y.S.C., 
with  a  rough  wooden  table  for  an  altar,  a 
cross  made  by  the  camp  carpenter  and  two 
candles  for  furniture,  and  boys,  confirmed 
ten  days  before,  they  and  Miss  N.,  for 
congregation.  Afterwards,  in  her  little 
room,  we  had  the  happiest  of  all  our  parties. 
Surely  our  Easter  eggs  were  good  to  eat. 

I  have  written  of  the  members  of  the 
Y.S.C.  as  boys.  They  were  boys,  but  every 
now  and  then  one  or  another  turned  out  to 
be  very  much  a  man  in  experience.  There 
was  one  whom  I  came  to  know  particularly 
well.  He  had  been  "  up  the  line "  and 
fought.  He  had  been  sent  down  because 
at  the  age  of  eighteen  he  could  not  stand 
the  strain. 

I  was  present  in  our  little  military  church 
when  he  was  baptized,  and  on  the  same 
afternoon  confirmed  by  Bishop  Bury.  I 
gave  him  his  confirmation  card  and  advised 


150  Y.S.C. 

him  to  send  it  home  to  his  mother  for  safety. 
"  I  think,  sir,"  he  said,  "  that  I  would 
rather  send  it  to  my  wife."  He  was  a 
fellow-citizen  of  mine,  born  and  bred  in 
Belfast.  We  Ulster  men  are  a  forward  and 
progressive  people. 


CHAPTER   X 

THE   DAILY   ROUND 

IN  the  camp  in  which  I  was  first  stationed 
there  was  a  story  current  which  must,  I 
think,  have  had  a  real  foundation  in  fact. 
It  was  told  in  most  messes,  and  each  mess 
claimed  the  hero  of  it  as  belonging  to  its 
particular  camp.  It  told  of  a  man  who 
believed  that  the  place  in  which  we  were 
was  being  continuously  and  severely  shelled 
by  the  Germans.  He  is  reported  to  have 
said  that  war  was  not  nearly  so  dangerous 
a  thing  as  people  at  home  believed,  for  our 
casualties  were  extraordinarily  few.  In- 
deed, there  were  no  casualties  at  all,  and  the 
shelling  to  which  he  supposed  himself  to  be 
subjected  was  the  most  futile  thing  imagin- 
able. 

A  major,  a  draft-conducting  officer,  who 
happened  to  be  with  us  one  day  when  this 
story  was  told,  improved  on  it  boldly. 

"  As  we  marched  in  from  the  steamer 
to-day,"  he  said,  "  we  passed  a  large  field  on 

151 


152  THE   DAILY  ROUND 

the  right  of  the  road  about  a  mile  outside 
the  camp — perhaps  you  know  it  ?  ': 

"  Barbed  wire  fence  across  the  bottom  of 
it,"  I  said,  "  and  then  a  ditch." 

"  Exactly,"  said  the  major.  "  Well,  one 
of  the  N.C.O.'s  in  my  draft,  quite  an  intelli- 
gent man,  asked  me  whether  that  was  the 
firing  line  and  whether  the  ditch  was  the 
enemy's  trench.  He  really  thought  the  Ger- 
mans were  there,  a  hundred  yards  from  the 
road  we  were  marching  along." 

I  daresay  the  original  story  was  true 
enough.  Even  the  major's  improved  ver- 
sion of  it  may  conceivably  have  been  true. 
The  ordinary  private,  and  indeed  the  ordin- 
ary officer,  when  he  first  lands  in  France,  has 
the  very  vaguest  idea  of  the  geography  of 
the  country  or  the  exact  position  of  the 
place  in  which  he  finds  himself.  For  all  he 
knows  he  may  be  within  a  mile  or  two  of 
Ypres.  And  we  certainly  lived  in  that  camp 
with  the  sounds  of  war  in  our  ears.  We  had 

quite  near  us  a  Perhaps  even  now  I 

had  better  not  say  what  the  establishment 
was  ;  but  there  was  a  great  deal  of  business 
done  with  shells,  and  guns  of  various  sizes 
were  fired  all  day  long.  In  the  camp  we 
heard  the  explosions  of  the  guns.  By  going 
a  very  little  way  outside  the  camp  we  could 


THE  DAILY  ROUND  153 

hear  the  whine  of  the  shells  as  they  flew 
through  the  air.  We  could  see  them  burst 
near  various  targets  on  a  stretch  of  waste 
marshy  ground. 

No  one  could  fail  to  be  aware  that  shells 
were  being  fired  in  his  immediate  neighbour- 
hood. It  was  not  unnatural  for  a  man  to 
suppose  that  they  were  being  fired  at  him. 
From  early  morning  until  dusk  squads  of 
men  were  shooting,  singly  or  in  volleys,  on 
two  ranges.  The  crackling  noise  of  rifle 
fire  seldom  died  wholly  away.  By  climbing 
the  hill  on  which  M.  lived,  we  came  close 
to  the  schools  of  the  machine  gunners,  and 
could  listen  to  the  stuttering  of  their  infer- 
nal instruments.  There  was  another  school 
near  by  where  bombers  practised  their  craft, 
making  a  great  deal  of  noise.  So  far  as 
sound  was  concerned,  we  really  might  have 
been  living  on  some  very  quiet  section  of  the 
front  line. 

We  were  in  no  peril  of  life  or  limb. 
There  were  only  two  ways  in  which  the 
enemy  worried  us.  His  submarines  occasion- 
ally raided  the  neighbourhood  of  our  harbour. 
Then  our  letters  were  delayed  and  our  supply 
of  English  papers  was  cut  off.  And  we  had 
Zeppelin  scares  now  and  then.  I  have 
never  gone  through  a  Zeppelin  raid,  and 


154  THE   DAILY   ROUND 

do    not    want    to.     The    threat    was    quite 
uncomfortable  enough  for  me. 

My  first  experience  of  one  of  these  scares 
was  exciting.  I  had  dined,  well,  at  a  hos- 
pitable mess  and  retired  afterwards  to  the 
colonel's  room  to  play  bridge.  There  were 
four  of  us — the  colonel,  my  friend  J.,  the 
camp  adjutant,  and  myself.  On  one  side 
of  the  room  stood  the  colonel's  bed,  a  camp 
stretcher  covered  with  army  blankets.  In 
a  corner  stood  a  washhand- stand,  with  a 
real  earthenware  basin  on  it.  A  basin  of 
this  sort  was  a  luxury  among  us.  I  had  a 
galvanised  iron  pot  and  was  lucky.  Many 
of  us  washed  in  folding  canvas  buckets. 
But  that  colonel  did  himself  well.  He  had 
a  stove  in  his  room  which  did  not  smoke, 
and  did  give  out  some  heat,  a  very  rare 
kind  of  stove  in  the  army.  He  had  four 
chairs  of  different  heights  and  shapes  and  a 
table  with  a  dark -red  table-cloth.  Over  our 
heads  was  a  bright,  unshaded  electric  light. 
Our  game  went  pleasantly  until — the  colonel 
had  declared  two  no-trumps — the  light  went 
out  suddenly  without  warning. 

The  camp  adjutant  immediately  said 
nasty  things  about  the  Royal  Engineers, 
who  are  responsible  for  our  lights.  J.  sug- 
gested a  Zeppelin  scare.  The  colonel,  who 


THE  DAILY  ROUND  155 

wanted  to  play  out  his  hand,  shouted  for 
an  orderly  and  light.  The  orderly  brought 
us  a  miserably  inefficient  candle  in  a  stable 
lantern  and  set  it  in  the  middle  of  the  table. 
It  was  just  possible  to  see  our  cards,  and  we 
played  on.  I  remembered  Stevenson's  ship- 
wrecked crew  who  gambled  all  night  on 
Medway  Island  by  the  light  of  a  fire  of 
driftwood.  I  thought  of  the  men  in  Hardy's 
story  who  finished  their  game  on  the  grass 
by  the  light  of  a  circle  of  glow-worms.  Our 
position  was  uncomfortable  but  picturesque. 
Another  orderly  came  in  and  said  that 
the  camp  adjutant  was  wanted  at  once  in 
his  office.  We  questioned  the  man  and  he 
confirmed  J.'s  fear  that  a  Zeppelin  scare  was 
in  full  swing.  The  adjutant  was  in  the 
position  of  dummy  at  the  moment  and  could 
be  spared.  We  played  on.  Then  a  note 
was  brought  to  J.  He  was  ordered  to 
report  at  once  at  the  camp  dressing  station, 
and  there  to  stand  by  for  casualties.  The 
colonel  picked  up  the  cards  and  shuffled 
them  thoughtfully.  He  meant,  I  think, 
to  propose  a  game  of  bezique  or  picquet. 
But  a  note  came  for  him,  an  order,  very 
urgent,  that  all  lights  should  immediately 
be  extinguished.  He  opened  the  stable 
lantern  and,  sighing,  blew  out  our  candle. 


156  THE   DAILY   ROUND 

"  One  blessing  about  this  Zeppelin  busi- 
ness," said  the  colonel,  "is  that  I  don't 
have  to  turn  out  the  men  on  parade." 

I  was  anxious  and  a  little  worried  because 
I  did  not  know  what  my  duties  were  in  a 
crisis  of  the  kind.  "  I  suppose,"  I  said, 
"  that  I  ought  to  stand  by  somewhere  till 
the  show  is  over."  I  looked  towards  the 
colonel  for  advice,  locating  him  in  the  dark- 
ness by  the  glow  of  his  cigar. 

"  I  advise  you  to  go  to  bed,"  he  said. 
"  I  mean  to.  Most  likely  nothing  will 
happen." 

I  felt  my  way  to  the  door.  The  colonel, 
taking  me  by  the  arm,  guided  me  out  of  his 
camp  and  set  me  on  the  main  road  which 
led  to  my  quarters. 

I  stumbled  along  through  thick  darkness, 
bumping  into  things  which  hurt  me.  I  was 
challenged  again  and  again  by  sentries, 
alert  and  I  think  occasionally  jumpy.  One 
of  them,  I  remember,  refused  to  be  satisfied 
with  my  reply,  though  I  said  "  Friend " 
loudly  and  clearly.  I  have  never  understood 
why  a  mere  statement  of  that  kind  made 
by  a  stranger  in  the  dark  should  satisfy  an 
intelligent  sentry.  But  it  generally  does. 

This  particular  man — he  had  only  landed 
from  England  the  day  before — took  a  serious 


THE   DAILY  ROUND  157 

view  of  his  duty.  For  all  he  knew  I  might 
have  been  a  Zeppelin  commander,  loaded 
with  bombs.  He  ordered  me  to  advance 
and  be  examined.  I  obeyed,  of  course,  and 
at  first  thought  that  he  was  going  to  examine 
me  thoroughly,  inside  and  out,  with  a 
bayonet.  That  is  what  his  attitude  sug- 
gested. I  was  quite  relieved  when  he 
marched  me  into  the  guard-room  and  paraded 
me  before  the  sergeant.  The  sergeant,  fortu- 
nately, recognised  me  and  let  me  go.  Other- 
wise I  suppose  I  should  have  spent  a  very 
uncomfortable  night  in  a  cell.  I  am  not 
at  all  sure  that  military  law  allows  a  prisoner's 
friends  to  bail  him  out. 

I  reached  my  hut  at  last  and  made  haste 
to  get  into  bed.  It  was  a  most  uncom- 
fortable business.  I  could  not  find  my 
toothbrush.  I  spent  a  long  time  feeling 
about  for  my  pyjamas.  I  did  not  dare 
even  to  strike  a  match.  An  hour  later 
some  hilarious  subalterns  walked  along  the 
whole  row  of  huts  and  lobbed  stones  on  to 
the  roofs.  The  idea  was  to  suggest  to  the 
inmates  that  bombs  were  falling  in  large 
numbers.  It  was  a  well-conceived  scheme  ; 
for  the  roofs  of  those  huts  were  of  corrugated 
iron  and  the  stones  made  an  abominable 
noise.  But  I  do  not  think  that  any  one  was 


158  THE   DAILY   ROUND 

deceived.    A  major  next  door  to  me  swore 
vehemently. 

Our  French  neighbours  did  not  take  much 
notice  of  these  alarms.  The  row  of  lamps 
in  the  little  railway  station  near  the  camp 
shone  cheerfully  while  we  were  plunged  in 
gloom.  The  inhabitants  of  the  houses  on 
the  hill  at  the  far  side  of  the  valley  did  not 
even  take  the  trouble  to  pull  down  their 
window  blinds.  Either  the  French  are  much 
less  afraid  of  Zeppelins  than  we  are  or  they 
never  heard  the  alarms  which  caused  us  so 
much  inconvenience.  These  scares  became 
very  frequent  in  the  early  spring  of  1916  and 
always  worried  us. 

After  a  while  some  one  started  a  theory 
that  there  never  had  been  any  Zeppelins 
in  our  neighbourhood  and  that  none  were 
likely  to  come.  It  was  possible  that  our 
local  Head-Quarters  Staff  was  simply  playing 
tricks  on  us.  An  intelligent  staff  officer 
would,  in  time,  be  almost  sure  to  think  of 
starting  a  Zeppelin  scare  if  he  had  not  much 
to  occupy  his  mind.  He  would  defend  his 
action  by  saying  that  an  alarm  of  any  kind 
keeps  men  alert  and  is  good  for  discipline. 

But  staff  officers,  though  skilful  in  military 
art,  are  not  always  well  up  in  general  litera- 
ture. Ours,  perhaps,  had  never  read  the 


THE   DAILY  ROUND  159 

"  Wolf,  wolf,"  fable,  and  did  not  anticipate 
the  result  of  their  action.  As  time  went 
on  we  took  less  and  less  notice  of  the  Zeppelin 
warnings  until  at  last  the  whole  thing  be- 
came a  joke.  If  a  Zeppelin  had  come  to 
us  towards  the  end  of  March  it  would  have 
had  the  whole  benefit  of  all  the  lights  which 
shone  through  our  tents  and  windows,  what- 
ever that  guidance  might  be  worth. 

The  Zeppelins  which  did  not  come  caused 
us  on  the  whole  more  annoyance  than  the 
submarines  which  did.  It  was,  of  course, 
irritating  when  the  English  post  did  not 
arrive  at  the  usual  hour.  It  always  did 
arrive  in  the  end — being  carried  by  some 
other  route,  though  our  own  proper  steamer 
neither  went  in  nor  out. 

But  if  we,  the  regular  inhabitants  of  the 
place,  suffered  little  inconvenience  from  the 
submarines,  the  officers  and  men  who  passed 
through  the  town  on  their  way  home  on  leave 
were  sometimes  held  up  for  days.  The  con- 
gestion became  acute.  Beds  were  very  diffi- 
cult to  obtain.  The  officers'  club  filled  up 
and  the  restaurants  reaped  a  harvest* 

The  authorities  on  these  occasions  behave 
in  a  peculiarly  irritating  way.  They  will 
not,  perhaps  cannot,  promise  that  their 
steamer  will  sail  at  any  particular  hour  or 


160  THE   DAILY  ROUND 

indeed  on  any  particular  day.  Nor  will 
they  give  an  assurance  that  it  will  not  sail. 
The  eager  traveller  is  expected  to  sit  on  his 
haversack  on  the  quay  and  watch,  day  and 
night,  lest  the  ship  of  his  desire  should  slip 
out  unknown  to  him.  It  is,  of  course, 
impossible  for  any  one  to  do  this  for  very 
long,  and  an  M.L.O. — M.L.O.'s  are  some- 
times humane  men — will  drop  a  hint  that 
the  steamer  will  stay  wrhere  she  is  for  two 
or  even  four  hours.  Then  the  watchers 
make  a  dash  for  club,  hotel,  or  restaurant, 
at  their  own  risk,  of  course;  the  M.L.O. 
gives  no  kind  of  promise  or  guarantee. 

There  was  at  that  time,  probably  still  is, 
a  small  shop  not  farfrom  Base  Head-Quarters 
which  had  over  its  door  the  words  "  Mary's 
Tea,"  in  large  letters.  The  name  was  an 
inspiration.  It  suggested  "  England,  home, 
and  beauty,"  everything  dearest  to  the  heart 
of  the  young  officer  in  a  strange  land.  As 
a  matter  of  fact  there  was  nothing  English 
about  the  place.  The  cakes  sold  were  de- 
lightfully French.  The  tea  was  unmistak- 
ably not  English.  The  shop  was  run  by 
five  or  six  girls  with  no  more  than  a  dozen 
words  of  English  among  them.  When  the 
leave  boat  was  held  up  "  Mary's  Tea  "was 
crammed  with  young  officers. 


THE   DAILY  ROUND  161 

I  remember  seeing  a  party  of  these  cheery 
boys   sitting   down  to   a  square   meal   one 
afternoon.     They   were   still    wearing   their 
trench  boots  and  fighting  kit.     They  were 
on  their  way  home  from  the  front  and  they 
were  hungry,  especially  hungry  for  cakes. 
There  were  four  of  them.     "  Mary  " — they 
called  all  the  girls  Mary,  the  name  of  the 
shop  invited  that  familiarity — brought  them 
tea  and  a  dish  piled  high  with  cakes,  frothy 
meringues,  pastry  sandwiches  with  custard 
in   the   middle,    highly   ornamental  sugary 
pieces    of  marzipan,    all   kinds   of   delicate 
confectionery.     After  the  fare  of  the  trenches 
these  were  dreams  of  delight,  but  not  very 
satisfying.      The   dish   was    cleared.      The 
spokesman,  the  French  scholar  of  the  party, 
demanded    more.      "  Mary " — he    did    not 
translate  the  name  into  "  Marie  " — "encore 
gateaux,  au  moins  trois  douzaine"     Mary, 
smiling,   fetched   another   dish.     I  suppose 
she  kept  count.     I  did  not,  nor  I  am  sure 
did  the  f casters.     They  finished  those  and 
repeated  the  encore.     The  au  moins  trois 
douzaine  was  a  ridiculous  under- estimate  of 
their   requirements.     It    might    have   been 
multiplied  by  five. 

In  the  end  there  were  no  more  gateaux, 
The  stock  was  sold  out.    It  was  not  a  large 
11 


162  THE   DAILY   ROUND 

shop  and  many  others  had  drunk  tea  there 
that  afternoon.  The  boys  paid  their  bill 
and  left,  still  astonishingly  cheerful.  I 
cannot  remember  whether  the  boat  sailed 
that  night  or  not.  I  hope  it  did.  I  hope 
the  sea  was  rough.  I  should  not  like  to 
think  that  those  boys — the  eldest  of  them 
cannot  have  been  twenty-one — suffered  from 
indigestion  during  their  leave.  Nothing 
but  a  stormy  crossing  would  have  saved 
them. 

If  the  spirit  of  the  playing  fields  of  our 
public  schools  won,  as  they  say,  our  great- 
grandfathers' war,  the  spirit  of  the  tuck 
shop  is  showing  up  in  this  one.  The  lessons 
learned  as  boys  in  those  excellent  institutions 
have  been  carried  into  France.  Tea  shops 
and  restaurants  at  the  bases,  audacious 
estaminets  near  the  front,  witness  to  the  fact 
that  we  wage  war  with  something  of  the 
spirit  of  schoolboys  with  pocket  money  to 
spend  on  "  grub." 

Nobody  will  grudge  our  young  officers 
their  boyish  taste  for  innocent  feasts.  It 
is  a  boys'  war  anyway.  Everything  big 
and  bright  in  it,  the  victories  we  have  won, 
the  cheerfulness  and  the  enduring  and  the 
daring,  go  to  the  credit  of  the  young.  It  is 
the  older  men  who  have  done  the  blundering 


THE   DAILY   ROUND  163 

and  made  the  muddles,  whenever  there  have 
been  blundering  and  muddles. 

"  Mary's  Tea  "  was  for  officers.  The  men 
were  invited  to  "  English  Soldiers'  Coffee." 
It,  too,  was  a  tea  shop  and  had  a  good 
position  in  one  of  the  main  streets  of  the 
town.  But  the  name  was  not  so  well 
devised  as  Mary's  Tea.  It  puzzled  me  for 
some  time  and  left  me  wondering  what 
special  beverage  was  sold  inside.  I  dis- 
covered at  last  that  "  Coffee  "  was  a  thought- 
ful translation  of  Cafe,  a  word  which  might 
have  been  supposed  to  puzzle  an  English 
soldier,  though  indeed  very  few  French 
words  puzzle  him  for  long. 

I  was  never  inside  "  English  Soldiers' 
Coffee."  But  I  have  no  doubt  it  would  have 
been  just  as  popular  if  it  had  called  itself  a 
cafe  or  even  an  estaminet.  The  case  of 
"  Mary's  Tea "  was  different.  Its  name 
made  it.  Half  its  customers  would  have 
passed  it  by  if  it  had  announced  itself  un- 
romantically  as  "  Five  o'clock  "  or  "  After- 
noon Tea." 


CHAPTER   XI 

ANOTHER   JOURNEY 

" 'Tis  but  in  vain  for  soldiers  to  complain" 
That  jingle  occurs  over  and  over  again  in 
Wolfe  Tone's  autobiography.  It  contains 
his  philosophy  of  life.  I  learned  to  appre- 
ciate the  wisdom  of  it  before  I  had  been  a 
week  in  the  army.  I  said  it  over  and  over 
to  myself.  If  I  had  kept  a  diary  I  should 
have  written  it  as  often  as  Wolfe  Tone  did. 
I  had  need  of  all  its  consolation  when  the 
time  came  for  me  to  leave  H. 

One  evening — I  was  particularly  busy  at 
the  moment  in  the  Y.S.C. — an  orderly  sum- 
moned me  to  the  chaplain's  office  to  answer 
a  telephone  call.  I  learned  that  orders  had 
come  through  for  my  removal  from  H.  to 
B.  I  had  twenty-four  hours'  notice.  That 
is  more  than  most  men  get,  double  as  much 
as  an  officer  gets  who  is  sent  up  the  line. 
Yet  I  felt  irritated.  I  am  getting  old  and 
I  hate  being  hustled.  Also  I  felt  quite  sure 

164 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  1G5 

that  there  was  no  need  for  any  kind  of 
hurry. 

As  it  appeared  in  the  end  I  might  just  as 
well  have  had  three  or  four  more  days 
quietly  at  H.  and  started  comfortably.  I 
arrived  at  my  destination,  a  little  breathless, 
to  find  I  was  not  wanted  for  a  week.  My 
new  senior  chaplain  was  greatly  surprised 
to  see  me.  My  predecessor  had  not  given 
up  the  post  I  was  to  fill.  There  was  nothing 
for  me  to  do  and  nowhere  for  me  to  go.  I 
spent  several  days,  most  unprofitably,  in 
B.  which  I  might  have  spent  usefully  in 
H.  But  this  is  the  way  things  are  done  in 
the  army,  sometimes ;  in  the  Chaplains' 
Department  generally.  And  "  'Tis  but  in 
vain  for  soldiers  to  complain." 

I  fully  expected  to  make  a  bad  start  on 
my  new  journey.  Having  been  fussed  I 
was  irritable.  I  had  spent  a  long  day  trying 
to  do  twenty  things  in  a  space  of  time  which 
would  barely  have  sufficed  for  ten  of  them. 
I  had  been  engaged  in  an  intermittent 
struggle  with  various  authorities  for  per- 
mission to  take  my  servant  with  me,  a 
matter  which  my  colonel  arranged  for  me 
in  the  end. 

I  was  in  the  worst  possible  mood  when  I 
reached  the  station  from  which  I  had  to 


166  ANOTHER   JOURNEY 

start — a  large  shed,  very  dimly  lit,  de- 
signed for  goods  traffic,  not  for  passengers. 
Oddly  enough  I  began  to  recover  my  temper 
the  moment  I  entered  the  station.  I  became 
aware  that  the  whole  business  of  the  starting 
of  this  great  supply  train  was  almost  per- 
fectly organised,  so  well  organised  that  it 
ran  more  smoothly,  with  less  noise  and 
agitation,  than  goes  to  the  nightly  starting 
of  the  Irish  mail  from  Euston. 

The    train    itself,    immensely    long,    was 
drawn  up  the  whole  length  of  the  station 
and  reached  out  for  a  distance  unknown  to 
me  into  the  darkness  beyond  the  station. 
There    were    passenger    coaches    and    horse 
waggons.     Every      waggon      was      plainly 
labelled  with  the  number  of  men  to  go  in 
it  and  the  name  of  the  unit  to  which  they 
belonged.     The  windows  of  every  compart- 
ment   of   the   passenger    coaches   bore   the 
names  of  four  officers.     A  fool  could  have 
been  in  no  doubt  about  where  he  had  to  go. 
The  fussiest   traveller   could   have   had   no 
anxiety  about  finding  a  seat.     Each  party  of 
men  was  drawn  up  opposite  its  own  part 
of  the  train.     The  men's  packs  and  arms 
were  on  the  ground  in  front  of  them.     They 
waited  the  order  to  take  their  places.     Com- 
petent  N.C.O.'s    with   lanterns    walked   up 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  167 

and  down  the  whole  length  of  the  station, 
ready  with  advice  and  help  when  advice 
and  help  were  needed. 

It  was  my  good  fortune  that  I  had  to 
visit  in  his  office  the  R.T.O.,  the  organ- 
ising genius  of  the  start.  My  servant 
arrived  at  the  last  moment,  an  unexpected 
traveller  for  whom  no  provision  had  been 
made.  The  order  which  permitted  him  to 
accompany  me  reached  him  only  after  I 
had  left  the  camp.  I  fully  expected  to  be 
snubbed,  perhaps  cursed,  by  that  R.T.O. 
I  was  an  utterly  unimportant  traveller.  I 
was  upsetting,  at  the  very  moment  of  starting, 
his  thought-out  arrangements.  He  would 
have  been  fully  justified  in  treating  me  with 
scant  courtesy. 

I  found  him  cool,  collected,  complete 
master  of  every  detail.  He  was  friendly, 
sympathetic,  ready  with  an  instant  solution 
of  the  difficulty  of  my  servant.  He  even 
apologised — surely  an  unnecessary  apology 
— for  the  discomfort  I  was  likely  to  suffer 
through  having  to  spend  the  night  in  a 
compartment  with  three  other  officer?.  I 
do  not  know  the  name  of  that  R.T.O.  I 
wish  I  did.  I  can  only  hope  that  his  abilities 
have  been  recognised  and  that  he  is  now 
commander-in-chief  of  all  R.T.O.'s. 


168  ANOTHER  JOURNEY 

The  night  was  not  very  unpleasant  after 
all.  My  three  fellow-travellers  were  peace- 
able men  who  neither  snored  nor  kicked 
wildly  when  asleep.  I  slumbered  profoundly 
and  did  not  wake  till  the  train  came  to  a 
standstill  on  an  embankment.  There  was 
no  obvious  reason  why  the  train  should 
have  stopped  in  that  particular  place  for  half 
an  hour  or  why  it  should  have  spent  another 
three-quarters  of  an  hour  in  covering  the 
last  mile  which  separated  us  from  the  station. 
But  I  know  by  experience  that  trains,  even 
in  peace  time,  become  very  leisurely  in 
approaching  that  particular  city.  They 
seem  to  wander  all  round  the  place  before 
finally  settling  down. 

In  peace  time,  travelling  as  a  tourist,  one 
does  not  complain.  The  city  is  rich  in  spires 
and  there  are  nice  views  to  be  got  from  the 
railway  carriage  windows.  We  got  rather  too 
much  of  those  views  that  morning.  Even 
Wordsworth,  though  he  did  write  an  early 
morning  sonnet  on  Westminster  Bridge,  would 
not  have  cared  to  meditate  on  "  Houses 
Asleep  "  for  an  hour  and  a  quarter  before  he 
got  a  wash  or  anything  to  eat. 

I  interviewed  the  R.T.O.  when  I  reached 
the  station  and  found  that  I  could  not 
continue  my  journey  till  5  o'clock  in  the 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  169 

afternoon.  I  was  not  altogether  sorry  to 
have  the  whole  day  before  me  in  a  town 
which  I  had  never  visited.  I  recollected 
that  I  had  a  cousin  stationed  there  and  made 
up  my  mind  to  rely  on  him,  if  I  could  find 
him,  for  entertainment. 

My  servant's  lot  was  less  fortunate.  He 
belonged,  of  course,  to  that  part  of  the  army 
which  is  officially  described  as  "  other 
ranks  "  ;  and  only  commissioned  officers  are 
trusted  to  wander  at  will  through  that  town. 
The  "  other  ranks  "  spend  the  day  in  the 
railway  station.  They  are  dependent  on  a 
Y.M.C.A.  canteen  for  food  and  on  them- 
selves for  amusement. 

I  spent  a  pleasant  day,  finding  my  cousin 
quite  early  and  visiting  with  him  a  large 
number  of  churches.  Some  day  I  mean  to 
work  out  thoroughly  the  connection  between 
that  town  and  Ireland  and  discover  why 
pious  Frenchmen  dedicated  several  of  their 
churches  to  Irish  saints. 

At  4  o'clock — I  like  to  be  in  good  time 
for  trains — I  went  back  to  the  station.  My 
servant  was  sitting  patiently  on  my  valise. 
A  long  train  lay  ready.  As  in  the  train  in 
which  I  had  travelled  the  night  before,  all 
the  coaches  and  waggons  were  carefully  and 
clearly  labelled,  but  this  time  with  the  names 


170  ANOTHER  JOURNEY 

of  the  places  to  which  they  were  going.  I 
went  the  whole  length  of  the  train  and  read 
every  label.  No  single  carriage  was  labelled 
for  B.,  my  destination.  I  walked  all  the 
way  back  again  and  read  all  the  labels  a 
second  time.  Then  I  fell  back  on  the  R.T.O. 
for  guidance.  I  found  not  the  man  I  had 
met  in  the  morning,  but  a  subordinate  of  his. 

"  I'm  going,"  I  said,  "  or  rather  I  hope 
to  go  to  B.  What  part  of  the  train  do  you 
think  I  ought  to  get  into  ?  " 

"  What  does  your  party  consist  of  ?  ':  he 
asked.  "  How  many  men  have  you  ?  " 

"  One,"  I  said.  "  You  can  hardly  call  it 
a  party  at  all.  There's  only  my  servant  and 
myself." 

He  lost  all  interest  in  me  at  once.  I  do  not 
wonder.  A  man  who  is  accustomed  to  deal 
with  battalions,  squadrons,  and  batteries 
cannot  be  expected  to  pay  much  attention 
to  a  lonely  padre.  quite  understood  his 
feelings. 

"  Still,"  I  said,  "  I've  got  to  get  there." 

"  You  can't  get  to  B.  in  that  train,"  he 
said.  "  It  doesn't  go  there." 

I  was  not  prepared  to  sit  down  under  that 
rebuff  without  a  struggle. 

"  The  R.T.O.  who  was  here  this  morning," 
I  said,  "  told  me  to  travel  by  this  train." 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  171 

"  Sorry,"  he  said.  "  But  you  can't,  or 
if  you  do  you  won't  get  to  B." 

"How  am  I  to  get  there  ?  "    I  asked. 

"  I  don't  know  that  you  can." 

"  Do  you  mean,"  I  said,  "  that  no  train 
ever  goes  there  ?  " 

He  considered  this  and  replied  cauti- 
ously. 

"  There  might  be  a  train  to-morrow,"  he 
said,  "  or  next  day." 

The  prospect  was  not  a  pleasant  one ;  but 
I  knew  that  R.T.O.'s  are  not  infallible. 
Sometimes  they  have  not  the  dimmest  idea 
where  trains  are  going.  I  left  the  office  and 
wandered  about  the  station  until  I  found 
the  officer  in  command  of  the  train.  He 
was  a  colonel,  and  I  was,  of  course,  a  little 
nervous  about  addressing  a  colonel.  But 
this  colonel  had  kindly  eyes  and  a  sorrowful 
face.  He  looked  like  a  man  on  whom  fate 
had  laid  an  intolerable  burden.  I  threw 
myself  on  his  mercy. 

"  Sir,"  I  said,  "  I  want  to  go  to  B.  I 
am  ordered  to  report  myself  there.  I  am 
trying  to  take  my  servant  with  me.  What 
am  I  to  do  ?  " 

That  colonel  looked  at  me  with  a  slow, 
mournful  smile. 

"  This   train,"   he  said,  "  isn't  supposed 


172  ANOTHER  JOURNEY 

to  go  to  B.  You  can't  expect  me  to  take 
it  there  just  to  suit  you  ?  " 

He  waved  his  hand  towards  the  train.  It 
was  enormously  long.  Already  several  hun- 
dred men  were  crowding  into  it.  I  could 
not  expect  to  have  the  whole  thing  diverted 
from  its  proper  course  for  my  sake.  I  stood 
silent,  looking  as  forlorn  and  helpless  as  I 
could.  My  one  hope,  I  felt,  lay  in  an  appeal 
to  that  colonel's  sense  of  pity. 

"  We  shall  pass  through  T.  to-morrow 
morning  about  6  o'clock,"  he  said. 

That  did  not  help  me  much.  I  had  never 
heard  of  T.  before.  But  something  in  the 
colonel's  tone  encouraged  me.  I  looked  up 
and  hoped  that  there  were  tears  in  my  eyes. 

"  T.,"  said  the  colonel,  "is  quite  close 
to  B.  In  fact  it  is  really  part  of  B.,  a  sort 
of  suburb." 

That  seemed  to  me  good  enough. 

"Take  me  there,"  I  said,  "and  I'll 
manage  to  get  a  taxi  or  something." 

"  But,"  said  the  colonel,  "  my  train  does 
not  stop  at  T.  We  simply  pass  through  the 
station.  But  I'll  tell  you  what  I'll  do.  I'll 
slow  down  as  we  go  through.  You  be  ready 
to  jump  out.  Tell  your  servant  to  fling  out 
your  valise  and  jump  after  it.  You  won't 
have  much  time,  for  the  platform  isn't  very 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  173 

long,  but  if  you're  ready  and  don't  hesitate 
you'll  be  all  right." 

I  babbled  words  of  gratitude.  The  pro- 
spect of  a  leap  from  a  moving  train  at  6  a.m. 
was  exhilarating.  I  might  hope  that  I 
should  find  my  servant  and  my  luggage 
rolling  over  me  on  the  platform  when  I 
reached  it.  Then  all  would  be  well.  The 
colonel,  moved  to  further  kindness  by  my 
gratitude,  invited  me  to  travel  in  a  coach 
which  was  specially  reserved  for  his  use. 

The  art  of  travelling  comfortably  in  peace 
or  war  lies  in  knowing  when  to  bully,  when 
to  bribe,  and  when  to  sue.  Neither  bullying 
nor  bribing  would  have  got  me  to  B.  If  I 
had  relied  on  those  methods  I  should  not 
have  arrived  there  for  days,  should  perhaps 
never  have  arrived  there,  should  certainly 
have  been  most  uncomfortable.  By  assum- 
ing the  manner,  and  as  far  as  possible  the 
appearance,  of  a  small  child  lost  in  London 
I  moved  the  pity  of  the  only  man  who  could 
have  helped  me.  But  those  circumstances 
were  exceptional.  As  a  general  rule  I  think 
bullying  and  bribing  are  better  ways  of 
getting  what  you  want  on  a  journey. 

I  travelled  in  great  comfort.  There  were 
three  of  us — the  colonel,  a  colonial  commis- 
sioner, in  uniform  but  otherwise  uncon- 


174  ANOTHER  JOURNEY 

nected  with  the  army,  and  myself.  There 
was  also  the  colonel's  servant,  who  cooked 
a  dinner  for  us  on  a  Primus  stove. 

The  train  stopped  frequently  at  wayside 
stations.  There  was  no  conceivable  reason 
why  it  should  have  stopped  at  all.  We 
neither  discharged  nor  took  up  any  pas- 
sengers. But  the  halts  were  a  source  of 
entertainment  for  the  men.  Most  of  them 
and  all  the  officers  got  out  every  time  the 
train  stopped.  It  was  the  duty  of  the 
colonel,  as  O.C.  Train,  to  see  that  they  all 
got  in  again. 

It  was  a  laborious  job,  not  unlike  that  of 
a  sheep  dog.  The  colonial  commissioner  and 
I  tried  to  help.  I  do  not  think;  we  were 
much  use.  But  I  have  this  to  my  credit.  I 
carried  a  message  to  the  engine  driver  and 
told  him  to  whistle  loud  and  long  before  he 
started.  Having  read  long  ago  Matthew 
Arnold's  Essay  on  Heine,  I  know  the  French 
for  "  whistle  "  or  a  word  which  conveyed 
the  idea  of  whistling  to  the  engine  driver. 

When  it  became  dark  the  worst  of  this 
labour  was  over  for  the  colonel.  The  men 
stayed  in  their  carriages.  I  suppose  they 
went  to  sleep.  We  dined.  It  was  a  pleasant 
and  satisfying  meal.  We  all  contributed 
to  it.  The  colonel's  servant  produced  soup, 


ANOTHER  JOURNEY  175 

hot  and  strong,  tasting  slightly  of  catsup, 
made  out  of  small  packets  of  powder  labelled 
44  Oxtail."  Then  we  had  bully  beef — perhaps 
the  44  unexpended  portion  "  of  the  colonel's 
servant's  day's  rations — and  sandwiches, 
which  I  contributed.  By  way  of  pudding 
we  had  bread  and  marmalade.  The  colonial 
commissioner  produced  the  marmalade  from 
his  haversack.  I  had  some  cheese,  a  Camem- 
bert,  and  the  colonel's  servant  brought  us 
sardines  on  toast,  and  coffee.  We  all  had 
flasks  and  the  colonel  kept  a  supply  of 
Perrier  water.  Men  have  fared  worse  on 
supply  trains. 

After  dinner  I  taught  the  colonel  and  the 
commissioner  to  play  my  favourite  kind  of 
patience.  I  do  not  suppose  the  game  was 
ever  much  use  to  the  commissioner.  In  his 
colony  life  is  a  strenuous  business.  But  I 
like  to  think  that  I  did  the  colonel  a  good 
turn.  His  business  was  to  travel  up  to  the 
rail  head  in  supply  trains  full  of  men,  and 
then  to  travel  down  again  in  the  same  train 
empty.  When  I  realised  that  he  had  been 
at  this  work  for  months  and  expected  to  be 
at  it  for  years  I  understood  why  he  looked 
depressed.  Train  co  nmanding  must  be  a 
horrible  business,  only  one  degree  better 
than  draft  conducting.  To  a  man  engaged 


176  ANOTHER  JOURNEY 

in  it  a  really  absorbing  kind  of  patience 
must  be  a  boon. 

The  next  morning  the  colonel  woke  me 
early  and  warned  me  to  be  ready  for  my 
leap.  In  due  time  he  set  me  on  the  step  of 
the  carriage.  He  took  all  my  coats,  rugs, 
and  sticks  from  me.  The  train  slowed  down. 
I  caught  sight  of  the  platform.  The  colonel 
said  "  Now."  I  jumped.  My  coats  and 
rugs  fell  round  me  in  a  shower.  My  servant 
timed  the  thing  well.  My  valise  came  to 
earth  at  one  end  of  the  platform.  The  man's 
own  kit  fell  close  to  me.  He  himself  lit 
on  his  feet  at  the  far  end  of  the  platform. 
The  train  gathered  speed  again.  I  waved  a 
farewell  to  my  benefactor  and  the  colonial 
commissioner. 


CHAPTER  XII 

MADAME 

MADAME  was  certainly  an  old  woman,  if 
age  is  counted  by  years.  She  had  celebrated 
her  golden  wedding  before  the  war  began. 
But  in  heart  she  was  young,  a  girl. 

I  cherish,  among  many,  one  special  picture 
of  Madame.  It  was  a  fine,  warm  afternoon 
in  early  summer.  The  fountain  at  the  lower 
end  of  the  garden  spouted  its  little  jet  into 
the  air.  Madame  loved  the  fountain,  and 
set  it  working  on  all  festive  occasions  and 
whenever  she  felt  particularly  cheerful.  I 
think  she  liked  to  hear  the  water  splashing 
among  the  water-lily  leaves  in  the  stone 
basin  where  the  goldfish  swam.  Behind  the 
fountain  the  flowers  were  gay  and  the  fruit 
trees  pleasantly  green  round  a  marvellous 
terra-cotta  figure,  life-size,  of  an  ancient 
warrior.  Below  the  fountain  was  a  square, 
paved  court,  sunlit,  well  warmed. 

Madame  sat  in  a  wicker  chair,  her  back 
to  the  closed  green  jalousies  of  the  dining- 
12  177 


178  MADAME 

room  window.  Beside  her  was  her  workbox. 
On  her  knees  was  a  spread  of  white  linen. 
Madame  held  it  a  sacred  duty  visiter  la 
linge  once  a  week ;  and  no  tear  remained 
undarned  or  hole  unpatched  for  very  long. 
As  she  sewed  she  sang,  in  a  thin,  high 
voice,  the  gayest  little  songs,  full  of  un- 
expected trills  and  little  passages  of  dancing 
melody. 

Madame  was  mistress.  There  was  no 
mistake  about  that.  Monsieur  was  a  retired 
business  man  who  had  fought  under  General 
Faidherbe  in  the  Franco-Prussian  war.  He 
was  older  than  Madame,  a  very  patient, 
quiet  gentleman.  He  was  a  little  deaf, 
which  was  an  advantage  to  him,  for  Madame 
scolded  him  sometimes.  He  read  newspapers 
diligently,  tended  the  pear  trees  in  the 
garden,  and  did  messages  for  Madame. 

There  was  also  Marie,  a  distant  cousin  of 
Monsieur's,  herself  the  owner  of  a  small 
farm  in  Brittany,  who  was — I  know  no  term 
which  expresses  her  place  in  the  household. 
She  was  neither  servant  nor  guest,  and  in 
no  way  the  least  like  what  I  imagine  a 
"  lady-help "  to  be.  She  was  older  than 
Madame,  older,  I  fancy,  even  than  Monsieur, 
and  she  went  to  Mass  every  morning. 
Madame  was  more  moderate  in  her  religion. 


MADAME  179 

Monsieur,  I  think,  was,  or  once  had  been, 
a  little  anti-clerical. 

Madame  was  the  most  tender-hearted 
woman  I  have  ever  met.  She  loved  all 
living  things,  even  an  atrocious  little  dog 
called  Fifi,  half  blind,  wholly  deaf,  and 
given  to  wheezing  horribly.  Only  once  did 
I  see  her  really  angry.  A  neighbour  went 
away  from  home  for  two  days,  leaving  a 
dog  tied  up  without  food  or  water  in  his 
yard.  We  climbed  the  wall  and,  with  im- 
mense difficulty,  brought  the  creature  to 
Madame.  She  trembled  with  passion  while 
she  fed  it.  She  would  have  done  bodily 
harm  to  the  owner  if  she  could. 

She  did  not  even  hate  Germans.  Some- 
times at  our  midday  meal  Monsieur  would 
read  from  the  paper  an  account  of  heavy 
German  casualties  or  an  estimate  of  the  sum 
total  of  German  losses.  He  chuckled.  So 
many  more  dead  Boches.  So  much  the 
better  for  the  world.  But  Madame  always 
sighed.  "  Les  pauvres  gardens,"  she  said. 
"  C'est  terrible,  terrible."  Then  perhaps 
Monsieur,  good  patriot,  asserted  himself 
and  declared  that  the  Boche  was  better 
dead.  And  Madame  scolded  him  for  his 
inhumanity.  Our  own  wounded — les  pauvres 
blesses — we  mentioned  as  little  as  possible. 


180  MADAME 

Madame  wept  at  the  thought  of  them,  and 
it  was  not  pleasant  to  see  tears  in  her  bright 
old  eyes. 

But  for  all  her  tender-heartedness  Madame 
did  not,  so  far  as  I  ever  could  discover,  do 
much  for  the  men  of  her  own  nation  or  of 
ours.  An  Englishwoman,  in  her  position 
and  with  her  vitality,  would  have  sat  on 
half  a  dozen  committees,  would  have  made 
bandages  at  a  War  Work  Depot,  or  packed 
parcels  for  prisoners ;  would  certainly  have 
knitted  socks  all  day.  Madame  did  no  such 
things.  She  managed  her  own  house,  mended 
her  own  linen,  and  she  darned  my  socks — 
which  was  I  suppose,  a  kind  of  war  work, 
since  I  wore  uniform. 

The  activities  of  Englishwomen  rather 
scandalised  her.  The  town  was  full  of 
nurses,  V.A.D.'s,  and  canteen  workers. 
Madame  was  too  charitable  to  criticise,  but 
I  think  she  regarded  the  jeune  fille  Anglaise 
as  unbecomingly  emancipated.  She  would 
have  been  sorry  to  see  her  own  nieces — 
Madame  had  many  nieces,  but  no  child  of 
her  own — occupied  as  the  English  girls  were. 

I  have  always  wondered  why  Madame 
took  English  officers  to  board  in  her  house. 
She  did  not  want  the  money  we  paid  her, 
for  she  and  Monsieur  were  well  off.  Indeed 


MADAME  181 

she  asked  so  little  of  us,  and  fed  us  so  well, 
that  she  cannot  possibly  have  made  a  profit. 
And  we  must  have  been  a  nuisance  to  her. 

In  England  Madame  would  have  been 
called  "  house  proud."  She  loved  every 
stick  of  her  fine  old-fashioned  furniture. 
Polishing  of  stairs  and  floors  was  a  joy  to 
her.  We  tramped  in  and  out  in  muddy 
boots.  We  scattered  tobacco  ashes.  We 
opened  bedroom  windows,  even  on  wet 
nights,  and  rain  came  in.  We  used  mon- 
strous and  unheard-of  quantities  of  water. 
Yet  no  sooner  had  one  guest  departed  than 
Madame  grew  impatient  to  receive  another. 

On  one  point  alone  Madame  was  obstin- 
ate. She  objected  in  the  strongest  way  to 
baths  in  bedrooms.  As  there  was  no  bath- 
room in  the  house,  this  raised  a  difficulty. 
Madame' s  own  practice — she  once  explained 
it  to  me — was  to  take  her  bath  on  the 
evening  of  the  first  Monday  in  every  month — 
in  the  kitchen,  I  think.  My  predecessors 
and  my  contemporaries  refused  to  be  satis- 
fied without  baths.  Madame  compromised. 
If  they  wanted  baths  they  must  descend  to 
le  cave,  a  deep  underground  cellar  where 
Monsieur  kept  wine. 

I,  and  I  believe  I  alone  of  all  Madame' s 
guests,  defeated  her.  I  should  like  to  be- 


182  MADAME 

lieve  that  she  gave  in  to  me  because  she 
loved  me  ;   but  I  fear  that  I  won  my  victory 
by  unfair  means.     I  refused  to  understand 
one  word  that  Madame  said,  either  in  French 
or    English,    about    baths.     I    treated    the 
subject  in  language  which  I   am  sure  was 
dark  to  her.     I  owned  a  bath  of  my  own 
and  gave  my   servant   orders  to  bring  up 
sufficient    water    every    morning,    whatever 
Madame  said.     He  obeyed  me,  and  I  washed 
myself,    more    or    less.     Madame   took    her 
defeat  well.     She  collected  quantities  of  old 
blankets,  rugs,   sacks,   and  bed  quilts.     She 
spread   them    over   the   parts    of  the   floor 
where  my  bath  was  placed.     I  tried,  honour- 
ably,   to    splash    as   little    as    possible    and 
always  stood  on  a  towel  while  drying  myself. 
After  all  Madame  had  reason  on  her  side. 
Water  is  bad  for  polished  floors,  and  it  is 
very  doubtful    whether  the  human  skin  is 
any  the  better  for  it.     Most  of  our  rules  of 
hygiene  are  foolish.     We  think  a  daily  bath 
is   wholesome.     We   clamour   for   fresh   air. 
We  fuss  about  drains.     Madame  never  opened 
a  window  and  had  a  horror   of  a  cowrant 
d'air.      The  only  drain  connected  with  the 
house  ran  into   the   well   from   which   our 
drinking    water    came.     Yet    Madame    had 
celebrated   her    golden    wedding    and    was 


MADAME  183 

never  ill.  Monsieur  and  Marie  were  even 
older  and  could  still  thoroughly  enjoy  a  jour 
de  fete. 

Madame  had  a  high  sense  of  duty  towards 
her  guests.  She  and  Marie  cooked  wonder- 
ful meals  for  us  and  even  made  pathetic 
efforts  to  produce  le  pudding,  a  thing  strange 
to  them  which  they  were  convinced  we 
loved.  She  mended  our  clothes  and  sewed 
on  buttons.  She  pressed  us,  anxiously,  to 
remain  tranquille  for  a  proper  period  after 
meals. 

She  did  her  best  to  teach  us  French.  She 
tried  to  induce  me — she  actually  had  induced 
one  of  my  predecessors — to  write  French 
exercises  in  the  evenings.  She  made  a 
stringent  rule  that  no  word  of  English  was 
ever  to  be  spoken  at  meals.  I  think  that 
this  was  a  real  self-denial  to  Madame.  She 
knew  a  little  English — picked  up  sixty 
years  before  when  she  spent  one  term  in  a 
school  near  Folkestone.  She  liked  to  air 
it ;  but  for  the  sake  of  our  education  she 
denied  herself.  We  used  to  sit  at  dinner 
with  a  dictionary — English-French  and 
French-English — on  the  table.  We  referred 
to  it  when  stuck,  and  on  the  whole  we  got 
on  well  in  every  respect  except  one. 

Madame  had  an  eager  desire  to  understand 


184  MADAME 

and  appreciate  English  jokes,  and  of  all 
things  a  joke  is  the  most  difficult  to  translate. 
A  fellow-lodger  once  incautiously  repeated 
to  me  a  joke  which  he  had  read  in  a  paper. 
It  ran  thus  :  "  First  British  Soldier  (in  a 
French  Restaurant)  :  '  Waiter,  this  'am's 
sigh.  'Igh 'am.  Compris?'  Second  British 
Soldier  :  4  You  leave  it  to  me,  Bill.  I  know 
the  lingo.  Gar^on,  Je  suis.' ' 

I  laughed.  Madame  looked  at  me  and 
at  W.,  my  fellow-lodger,  and  demanded 
a  translation  of  the  joke.  I  referred  the 
matter  to  W.  His  French  was,  if  possible, 
worse  than  mine,  but  it  was  he  who  had 
started  the  subject.  "  Ham,"  I  said  to 
him,  "  is  jambon.  Go  ahead."  W.  went 
ahead,  but  "  high  "  in  the  sense  he  wanted 
did  not  seem  to  be  in  the  dictionary.  I  had 
a  try  when  W.  gave  up  and  began  with  an 
explanation  of  the  cockney's  difficulty  with 
the  letter  "h."  Madame  smiled  uncompre- 
hendingly.  W.,  who  had  studied  the  dic- 
tionary while  I  talked,  made  a  fresh  start  at 
"  je  suis"  "  Je  suis — I  am.  Jambon — 
ham,  c'est  a  dire  '  '«m '  a  Londres."  We 
worked  away  all  through  that  meal.  At 
supper,  Madame,  still  full  of  curiosity,  set 
us  at  it  again. 

We  pursued  that  joke  for  several  days 


MADAME  185 

until  we  were  all  exhausted,  and  Madame, 
politely,  said  she  saw  the  point,  though  she 
did  not  and  never  will.  I  do  not  believe 
that  joke  can  be  translated  into  French. 
Months  afterwards  I  had  as  fellow-lodger  a 
man  who  spoke  French  well  and  fluently. 
I  urged  him  to  try  if  he  could  make  Madame 
understand.  He  failed. 

Madame  was  most  hospitable.  She  was 
neither  worried  nor  cross  when  we  asked 
friends  to  dine  with  us.  Indeed  she  was 
pleased.  But  she  liked  due  notice  so  that 
she  could  devote  proper  attention  to  la 
cuisine. 

M.,  who  was  at  that  time  with  a  cavalry 
brigade,  used  to  come  and  spend  a  night  or 
two  with  me  sometimes.  He  was  a  special 
favourite  with  Madame  and  she  used  to  try 
to  load  him  with  food  when  he  was  leaving. 
One  very  wet  day  in  late  autumn,  Madame 
produced  a  large  brown-paper  bag  and  filled 
it  with  pears.  She  presented  it  to  M.  with 
a  pretty  speech  of  which  he  did  not  under- 
stand a  word.  M.  was  seriously  embar- 
rassed. He  liked  Madame  and  did  not 
want  to  hurt  her  feelings  ;  but  he  had  before 
him  a  railway  journey  of  some  hours  and 
then  five  miles  on  horseback.  It  is  im- 
possible to  carry  a  brown-paper  bag  full  of 


186  MADAME 

pears  on  a  horse  through  a  downpour  of 
rain.  The  bag  gets  sopped  at  once  and 
the  pears  fall  through  it.  M.  pushed  the 
bag  back  to  Madame. 

"  Merci,  merci"  he  said.  "  Mais  non, 
pas  possible" 

Madame  explained  that  the  pears  were 
deliciously  ripe,  which  was  true. 

M.  said,  "  A  cheval,  Madame,  je  voyage  a 
cheval." 

Madame  pushed  the  bag  into  his  hands. 
He  turned  to  me. 

"  For  goodness'  sake  explain  to  her — 
politely,  of  course — that  I  can't  take  that 
bag  of  pears.  I'd  like  to.  They'd  be  a 
godsend  to  the  mess.  But  I  can't." 

Madame  saw  the  impossibility  in  the  end  ; 
but  she  stuffed  as  many  pears  as  she  could 
into  his  pocket,  and  he  went  off  bulging 
unbecomingly. 

M.  used  to  complain  that  he  ate  too  much 
when  he  came  to  stay  with  me.  I  confess 
that  our  midday  meal — we  ate  it  at  noon, 
conforming  to  the  custom  of  the  house — was 
heavy.  And  Madame  was  old-fashioned  in 
her  idea  of  the  behaviour  proper  to  a  hostess. 
She  insisted  on  our  eating  whether  we 
wanted  to  eat  or  not,  and  was  vexed  if  we 
refused  second  and  even  third  helpings. 


MADAME  187 

Madame  was  immensely  interested  in  food 
and  we  talked  about  marketing  and  cookery 
every  day.  I  came,  towards  the  end  of  my 
stay,  to  have  a  fair  knowledge  of  kitchen 
French.  I  could  have  attended  cookery 
lectures  with  profit.  I  could  even  have 
taught  a  French  servant  how  to  stew  a 
rabbit  in  such  a  way  that  it  appeared  at 
table  brown,  with  thick  brown  sauce  and  a 
flavour  of  red  wine.  The  marketing  for  the 
family  was  done  by  Madame  and  Marie, 
Marie  in  a  high,  stiff,  white  head-dress,  carry- 
ing a  large  basket. 

On  the  subject  of  prices  Madame  was 
intensely  curious.  She  wanted  to  know 
exactly  what  everything  cost  in  England  and 
Ireland.  I  used  to  write  home  for  informa- 
tion, and  then  we  did  long  and  confusing 
sums,  translating  stones  or  pounds  into 
kilos  and  shillings  into  francs ;  Monsieur 
intervening  occasionally  with  information 
about  the  rate  of  exchange  at  the  moment. 
Madame  insisted  on  taking  this  into  account 
in  comparing  the  cost  of  living  in  the  two 
countries.  Then  we  used  to  be  faced  with 
problems  which  I  regard  as  insoluble. 

Perhaps  a  sum  of  this  kind  might  be  set 
in  an  arithmetic  paper  for  advanced  students. 
"  Butter  is  2s.  Id.  a  pound;  A  kilo  is  rather 


188  MADAME 

more  than  two  pounds.  The  rate  of  ex- 
change is  27*85.  What  would  that  butter 
cost  in  France  ?  J! 

We  had  an  exciting  time  when  the  muni- 
cipal authorities  of  the  town  in  which  we 
lived  introduced  fixed  prices.  Madame,  who 
is  an  entirely  sensible  woman,  was  frankly 
sceptical  from  the  start  about  the  pos- 
sibility of  regulating  prices.  Gendarmes 
paraded  the  market-place,  where  on  certain 
days  the  countrywomen  sat  in  rows,  their 
vegetables,  fowl,  eggs,  and  butter  exposed 
for  sale.  They  declined,  of  course,  to  accept 
the  fixed  prices.  Madame  and  her  friends, 
though  they  hated  being  overcharged,  re- 
cognised the  strength  of  the  countrywomen's 
position.  There  was  a  combination  between 
the  buyers  and  sellers. 

The  gendarmes  were  out-witted  in  various 
ways.  One  plan — Madame  explained  it  to 
me  with  delight — was  to  drop  a  coin,  as  if  by 
accident,  into  the  lap  of  the  countrywoman 
who  was  selling  butter.  Ten  minutes  later 
the  purchaser  returned  and  bought  the 
butter  under  the  eyes  of  a  satisfied  police- 
man at  the  fixed  price.  The  original  coin 
represented  the  difference  between  what  the 
butter  woman  was  willing  to  accept  and 
what  the  authorities  thought  she  ought  to 


MADAME  189 

get.  That  experiment  in  municipal  control 
of  prices  lasted  about  a  month.  Then  the 
absurdity  of  the  thing  became  too  obvious. 
The  French  are  much  saner  than  the  English 
in  this.  They  do  not  go  on  pretending  to 
do  things  once  it  becomes  quite  plain  that 
the  things  cannot  be  done. 

Food  shortage — much  more  serious  now 
— was  beginning  to  be  felt  while  I  lived  with 
Madame.  There  were  difficulties  about  sugar, 
and  Monsieur  had  to  give  up  a  favourite 
kind  of  white  wine.  But  neither  he  nor 
Madame  complained  much ;  though  they 
belonged  to  the  rentier  class  and  were  liable 
to  suffer  more  than  those  whose  incomes 
were  capable  of  expansion.  No  one,  so  far 
as  I  know,  appealed  to  them  to  practise 
economy  in  a  spirit  of  lofty  patriotism. 
They  simply  did  with  a  little  less  of  every- 
thing with  a  shrug  of  the  shoulders  and  a 
smiling  reference  to  the  good  times  coming 
apres  la  guerre.  And,  on  occasion,  economy 
was  forgotten  and  we  feasted. 

One  of  the  last  days  I  spent  in  Madame's 
house  was  New  Year's  Day,  1917.  I  and  my 
fellow- lodger,  another  padre,  were  solemnly 
invited  to  a  dinner  that  night.  It  was  a 
family  affair.  All  Madame's  nieces,  married 
and  single,  were  there,  and  their  small 


190  MADAME 

children,  two  grand-nieces  and  a  grand- 
nephew.  Madame' s  one  nephew,  wounded 
in  the  defence  of  Verdun,  was  there. 

Our  usual  table  was  greatly  enlarged. 
The  folding  doors  between  the  drawing- 
room  and  dining-room  were  flung  open. 
We  had  a  blaze  of  lamps  and  candles.  We 
began  eating  at  6.30  p.m. ;  we  stopped 
shortly  after  10  p.m.  But  this  was  no 
brutal  gorge.  We  ate  slowly,  with  dis- 
crimination. We  paused  long  between  the 
courses.  Once  or  twice  we  smoked.  Once 
the  grand-niece  and  grand-nephew  recited 
for  us,  standing  up,  turn  about,  on  their 
chairs,  and  declaiming  with  fluency  and 
much  gesture  what  were  plainly  school-learnt 
poems.  One  of  Madame's  nieces,  passing 
into  the  drawing-room,  played  us  a  pleasant 
tune  on  the  piano.  At  each  break  I  thought 
that  dinner  was  over.  I  was  wrong  time 
after  time.  We  talked,  smoked,  listened, 
applauded,  and  then  more  food  was  set 
before  us. 

There  were  customs  new  to  me.  At  the 
appearance  of  the  plum  pudding— a  very 
English  pudding — we  all  rose  from  our 
seats  and  walked  in  solemn  procession  round 
the  table.  Each  of  us,  as  we  passed  the 
sacred  dish,  basted  it  with  a  spoonful  of 


MADAME  191 

blazing  rum,  and,  as  we  basted,  made  our 
silent  wish.  We  formed  pigs  out  of  orange 
skins  and  gave  them  lighted  matches  for 
tails.  By  means  of  these  we  discovered 
which  of  us  would  be  married  or  achieve 
other  good  fortune  in  the  year  to  come. 
We  drank  five  different  kinds  of  wine,  a 
sweet  champagne  coming  by  itself,  a  kind 
of  dessert  wine,  at  the  very  end  of  dinner, 
accompanied  by  small  sponge  cakes. 

The  last  thing  of  all  was,  oddly  enough, 
tea.  Like  most  French  tea  it  was  tasteless, 
but  we  remedied  that  with  large  quantities 
of  sugar  and  we  ate  with  it  a  very  rich  cake 
soaked  in  syrup,  which  would  have  deprived 
the  fiercest  Indian  tea  of  any  flavour. 

I  think  Madame  was  supremely  happy 
all  the  evening.  I  think  every  one  else  was 
happy  too.  I  have  never  met  more  courteous 
people.  In  the  midst  of  the  most  hilarious 
talk  and  laughter  a  niece  would  stop  laugh- 
ing suddenly  and  repeat  very  slowly  for 
my  benefit  what  the  fun  was  about.  Even 
when  the  soldier  nephew  told  stories  which 
in  England  would  not  have  been  told  so 
publicly,  a  niece  would  take  care  that  I 
did  not  miss  the  point. 

Madame's  drawing-room  was  very  wonder- 
ful. At  one  time  she  had  known  a  painter, 


192  MADAME 

a  professor  of  painting  in  a  school  near  her 
home.  He  adorned  the  walls  of  her  drawing- 
room  with  five  large  oil-paintings,  done  on 
the  plaster  of  the  wall  and  reaching  from 
the  ceiling  to  very  near  the  floor.  Four 
of  them  represented  the  seasons  of  the  year, 
and  that  artist  was  plainly  a  man  who  might 
have  made  a  good  income  drawing  pictures 
for  the  lids  of  chocolate  boxes.  His  fur- 
clad  lady  skating  (Winter)  would  have  de- 
lighted any  confectioner.  The  fifth  picture 
was  a  farmyard  scene  in  which  a  small  girl 
appeared,  feeding  ducks.  This  was  the  most 
precious  of  all  the  pictures.  The  little  girl 
was  Madame' s  niece,  since  married  and  the 
mother  of  a  little  girl  of  her  own. 

The  furniture  was  kept  shrouded  in  holland 
and  the  jalousies  were  always  shut  except 
when  Madame  exhibited  the  room.  I  saw 
the  furniture  uncovered  twice,  and  only 
twice.  It  was  uncovered  on  the  occasion 
of  the  New  Year's  feast,  and  Madame 
displayed  her  room  in  all  its  glory  on  the 
afternoon  when  I  invited  to  tea  a  lady  who 
was  going  to  sing  for  the  men  in  one  of  my 
camps. 

I  think  that  all  Madame's  lodgers  loved 
her,  though  I  doubt  if  any  of  them  loved 
her  as  dearly  as  I  did.  Letters  used  to 


MADAME  198 

arrive  for  her  from  different  parts  of  the 
war  area  conveying  news  of  the  officers 
who  had  lodged  with  her.  She  always 
brought  them  to  me  to  translate.  I  fear 
she  was  not  much  wiser  afterwards.  She 
never  answered  any  of  them.  Nor  has  she 
ever  answered  me,  though  I  should  greatly 
like  to  hear  how  she,  Monsieur,  Marie,  Fifi, 
and  Turque  are  getting  on.  Turque  was  a 
large  dog,  the  only  member  of  the  household 
who  was  not  extremely  old. 


13 


CHAPTER  XIII 

"  THE    CON.    CAMP  " 

WE  always  spoke  of  it,  affectionately  and 
proudly,  as  "  the  Con.  Camp."  The  abbrevia- 
tion was  natural  enough,  for  "convalescent" 
is  a  mouthful  of  a  word  to  say,  besides 
being  very  difficult  to  spell.  I  have  known 
a  beneficed  clergyman  of  the  Church  of 
England  come  to  grief  over  the  consonants 
of  the  last  two  syllables  in  addressing  an 
envelope  to  me ;  and  there  was  a  story  of 
a  very  august  visitor,  asked  to  write  in  an 
album,  who  inquired  about  a  vowel  and  was 
given  the  wrong  one  by  one  of  the  staff. 
If  those  doubtful  spellers  had  known  our 
pleasant  abbreviation  they  would  have 
escaped  disaster. 

To  us  the  "Con."  justified  itself  from 
every  point  of  view.  I  am  not  sure  that 
we  had  an  equal  right  to  the  conceited  use 
of  the  definite  article.  There  are  other 
"  Con."  camps  in  France,  many  of  them. 
We  spoke  of  them  by  their  numbers.  Ours 

194 


"THE  CON.   CAMP"  195 

had  a  number  too,  but  we  rarely  used  it. 
We  were  The  Con.  Camp.  Our  opinion 
was  no  doubt  prejudiced  ;  but  the  authorities 
seemed  to  share  it.  The  Con.  Camp  was 
one  of  the  show  places  of  the  British  Army. 
Distinguished  visitors  were  always  brought 
there. 

The  Government,  the  War  Office,  or  who- 
ever it  is  who  settles  such  things,  encourages 
distinguished  visitors  to  inspect  the  war. 
There  is  a  special  officer  set  apart  to  conduct 
tourists  from  place  to  place  and  to  show  them 
the  things  they  ought  to  see.  He  is  provided 
with  several  motor-cars,  a  nice  chateau, 
and  a  good  cook.  This  is  sensible.  If  you 
want  a  visitor  to  form  a  favourable  opinion 
of  anything,  war,  industry,  or  institution, 
you  must  make  him  fairly  comfortable  and 
feed  him  well. 

Yet  I  think  that  the  life  of  that  officer 
was  a  tiresome  one.  There  was  very  little 
variety  in  his  programme.  He  showed  the 
same  things  over  and  over  again,  and  he 
heard  the  same  remarks  made  over  and 
over  again  about  the  things  he  showed. 
Sometimes,  of  course,  a  distinguished  visitor 
with  a  reputation  for  originality  made  a 
new  remark.  But  that  was  worse.  It  is 
better  to  have  to  listen  to  an  intelligent 


"THE   CON.   CAMP" 

comment  a  hundred  times  than  to  hear  an 
unintelligent  thing  said  once.  Any  new 
remark  was  sure  to  be  stupid,  because 
all  the  intelligent  things  had  been  said 
before. 

To  us,  who  lived  in  the  Con.  Camp,  dis- 
tinguished visitors,  though  common,  were 
not  very  tiresome.  We  were  not  obliged 
to  entertain  them  for  very  long  at  a  time. 
They  arrived  at  the  camp  about  3.30  p.m., 
and  our  C.O.  showed  them  round.  After 
inspecting  an  incinerator,  a  tent,  a  bath, 
a  Y.M.C.A.  hut,  and  a  kitchen,  they  came 
to  the  mess  for  tea.  Our  C.O.  was  a  man 
of  immense  courtesy  and  tact.  He  could 
answer  the  same  question  about  an  in- 
cinerator twice  a  week  without  showing  the 
least  sign  of  ever  having  heard  it  before. 

I  have  often  wondered  who  selected  the 
distinguished  visitors,  and  on  what  principle 
the  choice  was  made.  Whoever  he  was  he 
cast  his  net  widely. 

Journalists  of  course  abounded,  American 
journalists  chiefly — this  was  in  1916 — but 
we  had  representatives  of  Dutch,  Norwegian, 
Swiss,  Italian,  Spanish,  Russian,  and  South 
American  papers.  Once  we  even  had  a 
Roumanian,  a  most  agreeable  man,  but  I 
never  felt  quite  sure  whether  he  was  a 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  197 

journalist  or  a  diplomatist.  Perhaps  he 
was  both. 

Authors — writers  of  books  rather  than 
articles — were  common  and  sometimes  were 
quite  interesting,  though  given  to  asking 
too  many  questions.  It  ought  to  be  im- 
pressed on  distinguished  visitors  that  it  is 
their  business  to  listen  to  what  they  are 
told,  and  not  to  ask  questions. 

Politicians  often  came.  We  once  had  a 
visit  from  Mr.  Lloyd  George,  but  I  missed 
that  to  my  grief. 

Generals  and  staff  officers  from  neutral 
countries  came  occasionally  in  very  attractive 
uniforms. 

Doctors  always  seemed  to  me  more  success- 
ful than  other  people  in  keeping  up  an 
appearance  of  intelligent  interest. 

Ecclesiastics  were  dull.  They  evidently 
considered  it  bad  form  to  allude  to  religion 
in  any  way  and  they  did  not  know  much 
about  anything  else.  But  ecclesiastics  were 
rare. 

Royalties,  I  think,  excited  us  most.  We 
once  had  a  visit  from  a  king,  temporarily 
exiled  from  his  kingdom.  He  wore  the  most 
picturesque  clothes  I  have  ever  seen  off  the 
stage  and  he  was  very  gracious.  All  of  our 
most  strikingly  wounded  men — those  who 


198  " THE   CON.   CAMP" 

wore  visible  bandages — ,vcre  paraded  for 
his  inspection.  He  walked  down  the  line, 
followed  by  a  couple  of  aides-de-camp,  some 
French  officers  of  high  rank,  an  English 
general,  our  C.O.,  and  then  the  rest  of  us. 
Our  band  played  a  tune  which  we  hoped 
was  his  national  anthem.  He  did  not  seem 
to  recognise  it,  so  it  may  not  have  been  the 
right  tune  though  we  had  done  our  best. 

He  stopped  opposite  an  undersized  boy  in 
a  Lancashire  regiment  who  had  a  bandage 
round  his  head  and  a  nose  blue  with  cold. 
The  monarch  made  a  remark  in  his  own 
language.  He  must  have  known  several 
other  languages — all  kings  do — but  he  spoke 
his  own.  Perhaps  kings  have  to,  in  order 
to  show  patriotism.  An  aide-de-camp  trans- 
lated the  remark  into  French.  An  inter- 
preter retranslated  it  into  English.  Some- 
body repeated  it  to  the  Lancashire  boy.  I 
dare  say  he  was  gratified,  but  I  am  sure  he 
did  not  in  the  least  agree  with  the  king. 
What  his  Majesty  said  was,  "  How  splendid 
,  a  thing  to  be  wounded  in  this  glorious 
war !  " 

It  is  easy  to  point  a  cheap  moral  to  the 
tale.  So  kings  find  pleasure  in  their  peculiar 
sport.  So  boys  who  would  much  rather  be 
watching  football  matches  at  home  suffer 


"THE  CON.   CAMP"  199 

and    are    sad.     Delirant   reges.      Plectuntur 
Achivi. 

It  is  all  as  old  as  the  hills,  and  republicans 
may  make  the  most  of  it.  Yet  I  think  that 
that  king  meant  what  he  said,  and  would 
have  felt  the  same  if  the  bandage  had  been 
round  his  own  head  and  he  had  been  wearing 
the  uniform  of  a  private  soldier.  There  are 
a  few  men  in  the  world  who  really  enjoy 
fighting,  and  that  king — unless  his  face  utterly 
belies  him — is  one  of  them.  Nothing,  I 
imagine,  except  his  great  age,  kept  him  out 
of  the  battles  which  his  subjects  fought. 

The  Con.  Camp  deserved  the  reputation 
which  brought  us  those  nights  of  distin- 
guished visitors.  I  may  set  this  down 
proudly  without  being  suspected  of  conceit, 
for  I  had  nothing  to  do  with  making  the 
camp  what  it  was.  Success  in  a  camp  or  a 
battalion  depends  first  on  three  men — the 
C.O.,  the  adjutant,  and  the  sergeant-major. 
We  were  singularly  fortunate  in  all  three. 

The  next  necessity  is  what  the  Americans 
call  "  team  work."  The  whole  staff  must 
pull  together,  each  member  of  it  knowing 
and  trusting  the  others.  It  was  so  in  that 
camp.  The  result  was  fine,  smooth-running 
organisation.  No  emergency  disturbed  the 
working  of  the  camp.  No  sudden  call  found 


200  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

the  staff  unprepared  or  helpless.  So  much, 
I  think,  any  one  visiting  and  inspecting  the 
camp  might  have  seen  and  appreciated. 
What  a  visitor,  however  intelligent,  or  an 
inspector,  though  very  able,  would  not  have 
discovered  was  the  spirit  which  inspired 
the  discipline  of  the  camp. 

Ours  was  a  medical  camp.  We  flew  the 
Red  Cross  flag  and  our  C.O.  was  an  officer  in 
the  R.A.M.C.  Doctors,  though  they  belong 
to  a  profession  which  exists  for  the  purpose 
of  alleviating  human  suffering,  are  not  always 
and  at  all  times  humane  men.  Like  other 
men  they  sometimes  fall  into  the  mistake 
of  regarding  discipline  not  as  a  means  but 
as  an  end  in  itself.  In  civil  life  the  par- 
ticular kind  of  discipline  which  seduces  them 
is  called  professional  etiquette.  In  the  army 
they  become,  occasionally,  the  most  bigoted 
worshippers  of  red-tape.  When  that  hap- 
pens a  doctor  becomes  a  fanatic  more 
ruthless  than  an  inquisitor  of  old  days. 

In  the  Con.  Camp  the  discipline  was  good, 
as  good  as  possible ;  but  our  C.O.  was  a 
wise  man.  He  never  forgot  that  the  camp 
existed  for  the  purpose  of  restoring  men's 
bodies  to  health  and  not  as  an  example  of 
the  way  to  make  rules  work.  The  spirit 
of  the  camp  was  most  excellent.  Regulations 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  201 

were  never  pressed  beyond  the  point  at 
which  they  were  practically  of  use.  Sym- 
pathy, the  sympathy  which  man  naturally 
feels  for  a  suffering  fellow-man,  was  not 
strangled  by  parasitic  growths  of  red-tape. 
We  had  to  thank  the  C.O.  and  after  him 
the  adjutant  for  this.  I  met  no  officers 
more  humane  than  these  two,  or  more 
patient  with  all  kinds  of  weakness  and 
folly  in  the  men  with  whom  they  had  to  deal. 

They  were  well  supported  by  their 
staff  and  by  the  voluntary  workers  in  the 
two  recreation  huts  run  by  the  Y.M.C.A. 
and  the  Catholic  Women's  League.  The 
work  of  the  C.W.L.  ladies  differed  a  little 
from  that  of  any  recreation  hut  I  had  seen 
before.  They  made  little  attempt  to  cater 
for  the  amusement  of  the  men.  They  dis- 
couraged personal  friendships  between  the 
workers  and  the  men.  They  aimed  at  a  cer- 
tain refinement  in  the  equipment  and  decora- 
tion of  their  hut.  They  provided  food  of  a 
superior  kind,  very  nicely  served.  I  think 
their  efforts  were  appreciated  by  many 
men. 

On  the  other  hand  the  workers  in  the 
Y.M.C.A.  hut  there  as  everywhere  made 
constant  efforts  to  provide  entertainments 
of  some  kind,  Three  or  four  days  at  least 


202  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

out  of  every  week  there  was  "  something 
on."  Sometimes  it  was  a  concert,  sometimes 
a  billiard  tournament,  or  a  ping-pong  tourna- 
ment, or  a  competition  in  draughts  or  chess. 
Occasionally,  under  the  management  of  a 
lady  who  specialised  in  such  things,  we  had 
a  hat- trimming  competition,  an  enormously 
popular  kind  of  entertainment  both  for 
spectators  and  performers.  Every  sugges- 
tion of  a  new  kind  of  entertainment  was  wel- 
comed and  great  pains  were  taken  to  carry 
it  through. 

I  only  remember  one  occasion  on  which  the 
leader  of  that  hut  shrank  from  the  form  of 
amusement  proposed  to  him.  The  idea 
came  from  a  Canadian  soldier  who  said  he 
wished  we  would  get  up  a  pie- eating  com- 
petition. This  sounded  exciting,  and  we 
asked  for  details.  The  competitors,  so  the 
Canadian  said,  have  their  hands  tied  behind 
their  backs,  go  down  on  their  knees  and  eat 
open  jam  tarts  which  are  laid  flat  on  the 
ground.  He  said  the  game  was  popular 
in  the  part  of  Canada  he  came  from.  I 
longed  to  see  it  tried ;  but  the  leader  of  the 
hut  refused  to  venture  on  it.  It  would,  he 
said,  be  likely  to  be  very  messy.  He  was 
probably  right. 

In  thatjiut  the  workers  aimed  constantly 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  203 

at  getting  into  personal  touch  with  the  men. 
This  was  far  easier  in  the  Con.  Camp  than  at 
the  base  camp  where  "  Woodbine  "  was.  The 
numbers  of  men  were  smaller.  As  a  rule 
they  stayed  longer  with  us.  But  at  best 
it  is  only  possible  for  a  canteen  worker  to 
make  friends  with  a  few  men.  With  most 
of  those  who  enter  the  hut  she  can  have 
no  personal  relations.  But  I  am  sure  that 
the  work  done  is  of  immense  value,  and  it  is 
probably  those  who  need  sympathy  and 
friendship  most  who  come  seeking  it,  a  little 
shyly,  from  the  ladies  who  serve  them. 

In  normal  times  the  Con.  Camp  received 
men  from  the  hospitals  ;  men  who  were  not 
yet  fit  to  return  to  their  regiments,  but  who 
had  ceased  to  need  the  constant  ministra- 
tions of  doctors  and  nurses.  The  conditions 
of  life  were  more  comfortable  than  in  base 
camps,  much  more  comfortable  than  at 
the  front  or  in  billets.  The  men  slept  in 
large  tents,  warmed  and  well  lighted.  They 
had  beds.  The  food  was  good  and  abundant. 
Great  care  and  attention  was  given  to  the 
cooking. 

Much  trouble  was  taken  about  amuse- 
ments. The  camp  had  a  ground  for  football 
and  cricket.  It  possessed  a  small  stage,  set 
up  in  one  of  the  dining-halls,  where  plays 


204  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

were  acted,  a  Christmas  pantomime  per- 
formed, and  a  variety  entertainment  given 
every  week.  There  were  whist  drives  with 
attractive  prizes  for  the  winners.  Duty 
was  light.  Besides  the  "  fatigues "  neces- 
sary for  keeping  the  camp  in  order  there 
were  route  marches  for  those  who  could 
march,  and  an  elaborate  system  of  physical 
exercises  under  trained  instructors. 

The  men  remained  in  camp  for  varying 
periods.  No  man  was  kept  there  for  more 
than  three  months.  But  some  men  passed 
through  the  camp  being  marked  fit  almost 
as  soon  as  they  left  hospital.  That  was  the 
normal  routine  ;  but  it  happened  once  while 
I  was  there  that  things  became  very  ab- 
normal and  the  organisation  of  the  camp 
was  tested  with  the  utmost  severity. 

Just  before  the  Somme  offensive  began 
some  mischievous  devil  put  it  into  the  heads 
of  the  authorities  to  close  down  the  only 
other  convalescent  camp  in  the  neighbour- 
hood. Its  inmates  were  sent  to  us  and  we 
had  to  make  room  for  them.  Our  cricket 
ground  was  sacrificed.  Paths  were  run 
across  the  pitch.  Tents  were  erected  all 
over  it.  My  church  tent  became  the  home 
of  a  harmonium,  the  only  piece  of  ecclesi- 
astical salvage  from  the  camp  that  was  closed. 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  205 

Then  my  church  tent  was  taken  from  me, 
sacrificed  like  all  luxuries  to  the  accommoda- 
tion of  men.  Just  as  we  were  beginning  to 
settle  down  again  came  the  Somme  offensive. 

Like  every  one  else  in  France  we  had  long 
expected  the  great  push.  Yet  when  it  came 
it  came  with  startling  suddenness.  We  went 
out  one  morning  to  find  the  streets  of  the 
town  crowded  with  ambulances.  They 
followed  each  other  in  a  long,  slow,  appar- 
ently unending  procession  across  the  bridge 
which  led  into  the  town  from  the  railway 
station.  They  split  off  into  small  parties 
turning  to  the  left  and  skirting  the  sea  shore 
along  the  broad,  glaring  parade,  or  climbed 
with  many  hootings  through  the  narrow 
streets  of  the  old  town.  Staring  after  them 
as  they  passed  us  we  saw  inside  figures 
of  men  very  still,  very  silent,  bandaged, 
swathed. 

All  the  morning,  hour  after  hour,  the  long 
procession  went  on.  The  ambulances, 
cleared  of  their  burdens  at  the  various 
hospitals,  turned  at  once  and  drove  furiously 
back  to  the  station.  The  hospitals  were 
filled  and  overfilled  and  overflowing.  Men 
who  could  stand  more  travelling  were  hurried 
to  the  hospital  ships.  Stretcher-bearers 
toiled  and  sweated.  The  steamers,  laden 


206  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

to  their  utmost  capacity,  slipped  from  the 
quay  side  and  crept  out  into  the  Channel. 
One  hospital  was  filled  and  cleared  three 
times  in  twenty-four  hours.  The  strain  on 
doctors  and  nurses  must  have  been  terrific. 

For  one  day  we  in  the  Con.  Camp  remained 
untouched  by  the  rushing  torrent.  Then 
our  turn  came.  The  number  of  lightly 
wounded  men  was  very  great.  Many  of 
them  could  walk  and  take  care  of  them- 
selves. A  hospital  bed  and  hospital  treat- 
ment were  not  absolutely  necessary  for  them. 
They  were  sent  to  us.  They  arrived  in 
char-a-bancs,  thirty  at  a  time.  We  possessed 
a  tiny  hospital,  meant  for  the  accommodation 
of  cases  of  sudden  illness  in  the  camp.  It 
was  turned  into  a  dressing-station. 

The  wounded  men  sat  or  lay  on  the  grass 
outside  waiting  for  their  turns  to  go  in. 
They  wore  the  tattered,  mud-caked  clothes 
of  the  battlefield.  The  bandages  of  the 
casualty  clearing-station  were  round  their 
limbs  and  heads.  Some  were  utterly  ex- 
hausted. They  lay  down.  They  pillowed 
their  heads  on  their  arms  and  sank  into 
heavy  slumber.  Some,  half  hysterical  with 
excitement,  sat  bolt  upright  and  talked, 
talked  incessantly,  whether  any  one  listened 
to  them  or  not.  They  laughed  too,  but  it 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  207 

was  a  horrible  kind  of  laughter.  Some 
seemed  stupefied;  they  neither  slept  nor 
talked.  They  sat  where  they  were  put, 
and  stared  in  front  of  them  with  eyes  which 
never  seemed  to  blink. 

Most  of  the  men  were  calm,  quiet,  and  very 
patient.  I  think  their  patience  was  the 
most  wonderful  thing  I  ever  saw.  They 
suffered,  had  suffered,  and  much  suffering 
was  before  them.  Yet  no  word  of  complaint 
came  from  them.  They  neither  cursed  God 
nor  the  enemy  nor  their  fate.  I  have  seen 
dumb  animals,  dogs  and  cattle,  with  this 
same  look  of  trustful  patience  in  their  faces. 
But  these  were  men  who  could  think,  reason, 
feel,  and  express  themselves  as  animals  can- 
not. Their  patience  and  their  quiet  trust- 
fulness moved  me  so  that  it  was  hard  not  to 
weep. 

By  twos  and  threes  the  men  were  called 
from  the  group  outside  and  passed  through 
the  door  of  the  dressing-station.  The  doctors 
waited  for  them  in  the  surgery.  The  label 
on  each  man  was  read,  his  wound  examined. 
A  note  was  swiftly  written  ordering  certain 
dressings  and  treatment.  The  man  passed 
into  what  had  been  the  ward  of  the  hospital. 
Here  the  R.A.M.C.  orderlies  worked  and 
with  them  two  nurses  spared  for  our  need 


208  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

from  a  neighbouring  hospital.  Wounds  were 
stripped,  dressed,  rebandaged.  Sometimes 
fragments  of  shrapnel  were  picked  out. 

The  work  went  on  almost  silently  hour 
after  hour  from  early  in  the  morning  till 
long  after  noon.  Yet  there  was  no  hurry, 
no  fuss,  and  I  do  not  think  there  was  a 
moment's  failure  in  gentleness.  Some  hard 
things  have  been  said  about  R.A.M.C.  order- 
lies and  about  nurses  too.  Perhaps  they 
have  been  deserved  occasionally.  I  saw 
their  work  at  close  quarters  and  for  many 
days  in  that  one  place,  nowhere  else  and 
not  again  there ;  but  what  I  saw  was  good. 

With  wounds  dressed  and  bandaged,  the 
men  went  out  again.  They  were  led  across 
the  camp  to  the  quartermaster's  stores  and 
given  clean  underclothes  in  place  of  shirts 
and  drawers  sweat  soaked,  muddy,  caked 
hard  with  blood.  With  these  in  their  arms 
they  went  to  the  bath-house,  to  hot  water, 
soap,  and  physical  cleanness.  Then  they 
were  fed,  and  for  the  moment  all  we  could 
do  for  them  was  done. 

These  were  all  lightly  wounded  men,  but, 
even  remembering  that,  their  power  of 
recuperation  seemed  astonishing.  Some 
went  after  dinner  to  their  tents,  lay  down 
on  their  beds  and  slept.  Even  of  them  few 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  209 

stayed  asleep  for  very  long.  They  got  up, 
talked  to  each  other,  joined  groups  which 
formed  outside  the  tents,  wandered  through 
the  camp,  eagerly  curious  about  their  new 
surroundings.  They  found  their  way  into 
the  recreation  huts  and  canteens.  They 
shouted  and  cheered  the  performers  at 
concerts  or  grouped  themselves  round  the 
piano  and  sang  their  own  songs.  Those  who 
had  money  bought  food  at  the  counter. 

But  many  had  no  money  and  no  prospect 
of  getting  any.  They  might  have  gone, 
not  hungry,  but  what  is  almost  worse, 
yearning  for  dainties  and  tobacco,  if  it  were 
not  for  the  generosity  of  their  comrades. 
I  have  seen  men  with  twopence  and  no 
more,  men  who  were  longing  for  a  dozen 
things  themselves,  share  what  the  twopence 
bought  with  comrades  who  had  not  even 
a  penny.  I  passed  two  young  soldiers  near 
the  door  of  a  canteen.  One  of  them  stopped 
me  and  very  shyly  asked  me  if  I  would  give 
him  a  penny  for  an  English  stamp.  He 
fished  it  out  from  the  pocket  of  his  pay-book. 
It  was  dirty,  crumpled,  most  of  the  gum 
gone,  but  unused  and  not  defaced.  I  gave 
him  the  penny.  "  Come  on,  Sam,"  he  said, 
"  we'll  get  a  packet  of  fags." 

They  say  a  lawyer  sees  the  worst  side  of 
14 


210  "THE  CON.   CAMP" 

human  nature.  A  parson  probably  sees  the 
best  of  it;  but  though  I  have  been  a  parson 
for  many  years  and  seen  many  good  men 
and  fine  deeds,  I  have  seen  nothing  more 
splendid,  I  cannot  imagine  anything  more 
splendid,  than  the  comradeship,  the  brotherly 
love  of  our  soldiers. 

The  very  first  day  of  the  rush  of  the  lightly 
wounded  into  our  camp  brought  us  men  of 
the  Ulster  Division.  I  heard  from  the 
mouths  of  the  boys  I  talked  to  the  Ulster 
speech,  dear  to  me  from  all  the  associations 
and  memories  of  my  childhood.  I  do  not 
suppose  that  those  men  fought  better  than 
any  other  men,  or  bore  pain  more  patiently, 
but  there  was  in  them  a  kind  of  fierce  resent- 
ment. They  had  not  achieved  the  conquest 
they  hoped.  They  had  been  driven  back, 
had  been  desperately  cut  up.  They  had 
emerged  from  their  great  battle  a  mere 
skeleton  of  their  division. 

But  I  never  saw  men  who  looked  less  like 
beaten  men.  Those  Belfast  citizens,  who 
sign  Covenants  and  form  volunteer  armies 
at  home,  have  in  them  the  fixed  belief  that 
no  one  in  the  world  is  equal  to  them  or  can 
subdue  them.  It  seems  an  absurd  and 
arrogant  faith.  But  there  is  this  to  be  said. 
They  remained  just  as  convinced  of  their 


"THE   CON.   CAMP"  211 

own  strength  after  their  appalling  experience 
north  of  the  Somme  as  they  were  when 
they  shouted  for  Sir  Edward  Carson  in  the 
streets  of  Belfast.  Men  who  believe  in  their 
invincibility  the  day  after  they  have  been 
driven  back,  with  their  wounds  fresh  and 
their  bones  aching  with  weariness,  are  men 
whom  it  will  be  very  difficult  to  conquer. 

Nothing  was  more  interesting  than  to 
note  the  different  moods  of  these  wounded 
men.  One  morning,  crossing  the  camp  at 
about  7  o'clock,  I  met  a  Canadian,  a 
tall,  gaunt  man.  I  saw  at  once  that  he  had 
just  arrived  from  the  front.  The  left  sleeve 
of  his  tunic  was  cut  away.  The  bandage 
round  his  forearm  was  soiled  and  stained. 
His  face  was  unshaven  and  very  dirty. 
His  trousers  were  extraordinarily  tattered 
and  caked  with  yellow  mud.  He  had  some- 
how managed  to  lose  one  boot  and  walked 
unevenly  in  consequence.  I  had  heard  the 
night  before  something  about  the  great 
and  victorious  fight  in  which  this  man 
had  been.  I  congratulated  him.  He  looked 
at  me  with  a  slow,  humorous  smile. 
"Well,"  he  drawled,  "they  certainly  did 


run  some." 


A  Lancashire  boy,  under-sized,  anaemic- 
looking,  his  clothes  hanging  round  him  in 


212  "THE   CON.   CAMP" 

strips,  got  hold  of  me  one  morning  outside 
the  dressing-station  and  told  me  in  a  high* 
pitched  voice  a  most  amazing  story.  It  was 
the  best  battle  story  I  ever  heard  from  the 
lips  of  a  soldier,  and  the  boy  who  told  it  to 
me  was  hysterical.  He  had  been  buried 
twice,  he  and  his  officer  and  his  Lewis  gun, 
in  the  course  of  an  advance.  He  had  met 
the  Prussian  Guard  in  the  open,  he  and  his 
comrades,  and  the  famous  crack  corps  had 
"  certainly  run  some."  That  was  not  the 
boy's  phrase.  When  he  reached  the  climax 
of  his  tale  his  language  was  a  rich  mixture 
of  blasphemy  and  obscenity. 

There  was  a  Munster  Fusilier,  an  elderly, 
grizzled  man  who  had  been  sent  back  with 
some  German  prisoners.  He  had,  by  his 
own  account,  quite  a  flock  of  them  when 
he  started.  He  found  himself,  owing  to 
shrapnel  and  other  troubles,  with  only  one 
left  when  he  drew  near  his  destination. 

But  he  was  a  provident  man.  He  had 
collected  all  available  loot  from  the  men 
who  had  fallen  on  the  way  down,  and  the 
unfortunate  survivor  was  so  laden  that  he 
collapsed,  sank  into  the  mud  under  an 
immense  load  of  helmets,  caps,  belts,  every- 
thing that  could  have  been  taken  from  the 
dead.  The  Munster  Fusilier  stood  over  him 


"THE  CON.   CAMP"  213 

with  his  rifle.     "  You  misfortunate  b ," 

he  said.  "  And  them  words,"  he  said  to 
me  confidentially,  "  got  a  move  on  him, 
though  it  was  myself  had  to  carry  the  load 
for  him  the  rest  of  the  way." 


CHAPTER   XIV 

A   BACKWATER 

I  LOOK  back  with  great  pleasure  on  my 
connection  with  the  Emergency  Stretcher- 
bearers'  Camp.  It  was  one  of  three  camps 
in  which  I  worked  when  I  went  to  B.  I 
liked  all  three  camps  and  every  one  in  them, 
but  I  cherish  a  feeling  of  particular  tender- 
ness for  the  Stretcher-bearers. 

Yet  my  first  experience  there  was  far  from 
encouraging.  The  day  after  I  took  over  from 
my  predecessor  I  ventured  into  the  men's 
recreation  room.  I  was  received  with  silence, 
frosty  and  most  discouraging.  I  made  a 
few  remarks  about  the  weather.  I  com- 
mented on  the  stagnant  condition  of  the 
war  at  the  moment.  The  things  I  said  were 
banal  and  foolish  no  doubt,  yet  I  meant 
well  and  scarcely  deserved  the  reply  which 
came  at  last.  A  man  who  was  playing 
billiards  dropped  the  butt  of  his  cue  on  the 
ground  with  a  bang,  surveyed  me  with  a 
hostile  stare  and  said : 

214 


A  BACKWATER  215 

"  We  don't  want  no  -      -  parsons  here." 

Somebody  in  a  far  corner  of  the  room 
protested  mildly. 

44  Language,  language,"  he  said. 

I  did  not  really  object  much  to  the  lan- 
guage. I  had  heard  the  British  soldiers' 
favourite  word  too  often  to  be  shocked  by 
it.  What  did  hurt  and  embarrass  me  was 
the  fact  that  I  was  not  welcome ;  and  no 
one  made  any  attempt  to  reassure  me  on 
that  point. 

Indeed  when  the  same  unpleasant  fact 
that  I  really  was  not  welcome  was  conveyed 
to  me  without  obscenity  in  the  next  camp 
and  with  careful  politeness  in  the  third  I 
found  it  even  more  disagreeable  than  it  was 

when  the  stretcher-bearer  called  me  a  

parson.  The  officers  in  the  convalescent 
camp,  the  centre  camp  in  my  charge,  were 
all  kindness  in  their  welcome ;  but  the 
sergeant- maj  or  -  — .  We  became  fast  f ri ends 
afterwards,  but  the  day  we  first  met  he 
looked  me  over  and  decided  that  I  was  an 
inefficient  simpleton.  Without  speaking  a 
word  he  made  his  opinion  plain  to  me.  He 
was  appallingly  efficient  himself  and  I  do 
not  think  he  ever  altered  his  perfectly  just 
opinion  of  me.  But  in  the  end,  and  long 
before  the  end,  he  did  all  he  could  to  help  me. 


216  A  BACKWATER 

The  worst  of  all  the  snubs  waited  me  in 
Marlborough  Camp,  and  came  from  a  lady 
worker,  afterwards  the  dearest  and  most 
valued  of  the  many  friends  I  made  in  France. 
I  shall  not  soon  forget  the  day  I  first  entered 
her  canteen.  She  and  her  fellow-worker, 
also  a  valued  friend  now,  did  not  call  me  a 

parson  "  ;    but  they  left  me  under 

the  impression  that  I  was  not  wanted  there. 
Her  snub,  delivered  as  a  lady  delivers  such 
things,  was  the  worst  of  the  three. 

For  my  reception  in  the  Stretcher-bearers' 
Camp  I  was  prepared. 

"  You'll  find  those  fellows  a  pretty  tough 
crowd,"  so  some  one  warned  me. 

"  Those  old  boys  are  bad  lots,"  said  some 
one  else.  "  You'll  not  do  any  good  with 
them." 

I  agree  with  the  "  tough."  I  totally  dis- 
agree with  the  "  bad."  Even  if,  after  eight 
months,  I  had  been  bidden  farewell  in  the 
same  phrase  with  which  I  was  greeted,  I 
should  still  refuse  to  say  "  bad  lot "  about 
those  men.  I  hope  that  in  such  a  case  I 
should  have  the  grace  to  recognise  the 
failure  as  my  fault,  not  theirs,  and  to  take 
the  "  bad  lot "  as  a  description  of  myself. 

The  Emergency  Stretcher-bearers  when 
I  first  knew  them  were  no  man's  children. 


A  BACKWATER  217 

The  Red  Cross  flag  flew  over  the  entrance 
of  their  camp,  but  the  Red  Cross  people 
accepted  no  responsibility  for  them.  Their 
recreation  room,  which  was  not  a  room  at 
all,  but  one  end  of  their  gaunt  dining-room, 
was  ill  supplied  with  books  and  games,  and 
had  no  papers.  There  were  no  lady  workers 
in  or  near  the  camp,  and  only  those  who  have 
seen  the  work  which  our  ladies  do  in  canteens 
in  France  can  realise  how  great  the  loss  was. 
There  was  no  kind  of  unity  in  the  camp. 

It  was  a  small  place.  There  were  not  more 
than  three  hundred  men  altogether.  But 
they  were  men  from  all  sorts  of  regiments. 
I  think  that  when  I  knew  the  camp  first, 
nearly  every  one  in  it  belonged  to  the  old 
army.  They  were  gathered  there,  the  sal- 
vage of  the  Mons  retreat,  of  the  Marne,  of  the 
glorious  first  battle  of  Ypres,  broken  men 
every  one  of  them,  debris  tossed  by  the 
swirling  currents  of  war  into  this  backwater. 
Their  work  was  heavy,  thankless,  and 
uninspiring.  They  were  camped  on  a  hill. 
Day  after  day  they  marched  down  through 
the  streets  of  the  town  to  the  railway  station 
or  the  quay.  They  carried  the  wounded  on 
stretchers  from  the  hospital  trains  to  the 
Red  Cross  ambulances ;  or  afterwards  from 
the  ambulance  cars  up  steep  gangways  to 


218  A  BACKWATER 

the  decks  and  cabins  of  hospital  ships. 
They  were  summoned  by  telephone  at  all 
hours.  They  toiled  in  the  grey  light  of 
early  dawn.  They  sweated  at  noonday. 
Soaked  and  dripping  they  bent  their  backs 
to  their  burdens  in  storm  and  rain.  They 
went  long  hours  without  food.  They  lived 
under  conditions  of  great  discomfort.  It 
was  everybody's  business  to  curse  and 
'*  strafe "  them.  I  do  not  remember  that 
any  one  ever  gave  them  a  word  of  praise. 

It  was  the  camp,  of  all  that  I  was  ever  in, 
which  seemed  to  offer  the  richest  yield  to  the 
gleaner  of  war  stories.  I  have  always  wanted 
to  know  what  that  retreat  from  Mons  felt 
like  to  the  men  who  went  through  it.  We 
are  assured,  and  I  do  not  doubt  it,  that  our 
men  never  thought  of  themselves  as  beaten. 
What  did  they  think  when  day  after  day 
they  retreated  at  top  speed  ?  Of  what  they 
suffered  we  "know  something.  How  they 
took  their  suffering  we  only  guess.  I  hoped 
when  I  made  friends  with  those  men  to  hear 
all  this  and  many  strange  tales  of  personal 
adventures. 

But  the  British  soldier,  even  of  the  new 
army,  is  strangely  inarticulate.  The  men 
of  the  old  army,  so  far  as  concerns  their 
fighting,  are  almost  dumb.  They  would  talk 


A  BACKWATER  219 

about  anything  rather  than  their  battles. 
There  was  a  man  in  the  Life  Guards  who 
had  received  three  wounds  in  one  of  the 
early  cavalry  skirmishes.  He  wanted  to 
talk  about  cricket,  and  told  me  stories 
about  a  church  choir  in  which  he  sang  when 
he  was  a  boy. 

There  was  a  Coldstream  Guardsman.  I 
never  succeeded  in  finding  out  whether  he 
was  in  the  famous  Landrecies  fight  or  not. 
The  most  he  would  do  in  the  way  of  military 
talk  was  to  complain,  privately,  to  me  of 
the  lax  discipline  in  the  camp,  and  to  com- 
pare the  going  of  his  comrades  from  the 
camp  to  the  quay  with  the  marching  of  the 
Coldstreamers  on  their  way  to  relieve  guard 
at  Buckingham  Palace.  There  was  an  old 
sergeant  from  County  Down  who  was  more 
interested  in  growing  vegetables — we  had  a 
garden — than  anything  else,  and  a  Munster 
Fusilier  who  came  from  Derry,  of  all  places, 
and  exulted  in  the  fact  that  his  sons  had 
taken  his  place  in  the  regiment. 

At  first  this  curious  reticence  was  a  dis- 
appointment to  me.  It  is  still  a  wonder. 
I  am  sure  that  if  I  had  been  one  of  the  "Old 
Contemptibles "  I  should  talk  of  nothing 
else  all  my  life.  But  I  came  to  see  afterwards 
that  if  I  had  heard  battle  stories  I  should 


220  A  BACKWATER 

never  have  known  the  men.  The  centre  of 
interest  of  their  lives  was  at  home.  They, 
even  those  professional  soldiers,  were  men 
of  peace  rather  than  war.  The  soldiers' 
trade  was  no  delight  to  them. 

I  dare  say  the  Germans,  who  took  pains 
to  learn  so  much  about  us  beforehand,  knew 
this,  and  drew,  as  Germans  so  often  do, 
a  wrong  inference  from  facts  patiently 
gathered.  They  thought  that  men  who  do 
not  like  fighting  fight  badly.  It  may  be  so 
sometimes.  It  was  certainly  not  so  with 
our  old  army.  We  know  now  that  it 
is  not  so  with  the  men  of  our  new  army 
either. 

After  a  while  the  stretcher-bearers  and  I 
began  to  know  each  other.  The  first  sign 
of  friendliness  was  a  request  that  I  should 
umpire  at  a  cricket  match  on  a  Sunday 
afternoon.  I  am  not  sure  that  the  invita- 
tion was  not  also  a  test.  Some  parsons, 

the    " "    kind,    who    are   not    wanted, 

object  to  cricket  on  Sundays.  My  own 
conscience  is  more  accommodating.  I  would 
gladly  have  umpired  at  Monte  Carlo  on  Good 
Friday,  Easter,  Advent  Sunday,  and  Christ- 
mas, all  rolled  into  one,  if  those  men  had 
asked  me. 

Later  on,  after  many  cricket  matches,  we 


A   BACKWATER  221 

agreed  that  it  was  desirable  to  get  up  enter- 
tainments in  the  camp.  There  was  no  local 
talent,  or  none  available  at  first,  but  I  had 
the  good  luck  to  meet  one  day  a  very  amiable 
lady  who  undertook  to  run  a  whole  enter- 
tainment herself.  She  also  promised  not  to 
turn  round  and  walk  away  when  she  saw 
the  piano. 

We  stirred  ourselves,  determined  to  rise  to 
the  occasion.  We  made  a  platform  at  the 
end  of  the  dining-room.  I  took  care  not 
to  ask,  and  I  do  not  know,  where  the  wood 
for  that  platform  came  from.  We  dis- 
covered among  us  a  man  who  said  he  had 
been  a  theatrical  scene  painter  before  he 
joined  the  R.E.  He  can  never,  I  fancy, 
have  had  much  chance  of  rising  to  the  top 
of  his  old  profession,  but  he  painted  a  back 
scene  for  our  stage.  It  represented  a  country 
cottage  standing  in  a  field,  and  approached 
by  an  immensely  long,  winding,  brown  path. 
The  perspective  of  that  path  was  wonderful. 
He  also  painted  and  set  up  two  wings  on  the 
stage  which  were  easily  recognisable  as  leafy 
trees.  For  many  Sundays  afterwards  I 
stood  in  front  of  that  cottage  with  a  green 
tree  on  each  side  of  me  during  morning 
service. 

Another    artist    volunteered    to    do    our 


222  A  BACKWATER 

programmes.  His  work  lay  in  the  orderly- 
room  and  he  had  at  command  various 
coloured  inks,  black,  violet,  blue,  and  red. 
He  produced  a  programme  like  a  rainbow 
on  which  he  described  our  lady  visitor  as 
the  "  Famous  Favourite  of  the  Music  Hall 
Stage."  She  had,  in  fact,  delighted  theatre 
goers  before  her  marriage,  but  not  on  the 
music  hall  stage.  I  showed  her  the  pro- 
gramme nervously,  but  I  need  not  have  been 
nervous.  She  entered  into  the  spirit  of  the 
thing. 

A  thoughtful  sergeant,  without  consulting 
me,  prepared  for  her  a  dressing-room  at  the 
back  of  the  stage.  A  modest  man  himself, 
he  insisted  upon  my  leading  her  to  it.  We 
found  there  a  shelf,  covered  with  news- 
paper. On  it  was  a  shaving  mirror,  a 
large  galvanised-iron  tub  half  full  of  cold 
water,  a  cake  of  brown  soap,  a  tattered 
towel,  and  a  comb.  Also  there  was  a 
tumbler,  a  siphon  of  soda  water,  and  a 
bottle  of  port. 

"The  dears,"  she  said.  "But  I  can't 
change  my  frock;  I've  nothing  but  what 
I  stand  up  in.  What  shall  I  do  ?  " 

I  glanced  at  the  bottle  of  port ;  but  she 
shrank  from  that. 

"  I  must  do  something,"  she  said.     "  I'll 


A  BACKWATER  228 

powder  my  nose."     The  shaving  mirror,  at 
least,  was  some  use. 

The  entertainment  began  stiffly.  We  were 
not  accustomed  to  entertainments  and  felt 
that  we  ought  to  behave  with  propriety. 
We  clapped  at  the  end  of  each  song,  but  we 
displayed  no  enthusiasm.  I  began  to  fear 
for  our  success.  But  our  lady — she  did  the 
whole  thing  herself — conquered  us.  We 
were  laughing  and  cheering  in  half  an  hour. 
In  the  end  we  rocked  in  our  seats  and  howled 
tumultuously  when  the  sergeant-major,  a 
portly  man  of  great  dignity,  was  dragged 
over  the  footlights.  Our  lady  pirouetted 
across  the  stage  and  back  again,  her  arm 
round  the  sergeant-major's  waist,  her  cheek 
on  his  shoulder,  singing,  "  If  I  were  the 
only  girl  in  the  world  and  you  were  the 
only  boy." 

We  believed  in  doing  what  we  could  for 
those  who  came  to  entertain  us.  When  we 
secured  the  services  of  a  "  Le  a  Ashwell  " 
Concert  Party  we  painted  a  large  sign  and 
hung  it  up  in  front  of  the  stage :  "  Welcome 
to  the  Concert  Party."  We  forgot  the 
second  "  e  "  in  Welcome  and  it  had  to  be 
crammed  in  at  the  last  moment  above  the 
"  m  "  with  a  "  A  "  underneath  it. 

We   made   two   dressing-rooms,    one   for 


224  A  BACKWATER 

ladies  and  one  for  gentlemen.  The  fittings 
were  the  same — brown  soap,  cold  water, 
shaving  mirror,  tumbler  and  siphon.  But 
in  the  gentlemen's  room  we  put  whisky,  in 
the  ladies'  port.  The  whole  party  had  tea 
afterwards  in  the  sergeants'  mess — strong 
tea  and  tinned  tongue.  A  corporal  stood 
at  the  door  as  we  left  holding  a  tray  covered 
with  cigarettes. 

I  learned  to  play  cribbage  while  I  was  in 
that  camp.  I  was  pitted,  by  common 
consent,  against  an  expert,  a  man  who  had 
been  wounded  at  Le  Cateau  and  had  his 
teeth  knocked  out  as  he  lay  on  the  ground 
by  a  passing  German,  who  used  the  butt 
of  his  rifle.  Round  me  were  a  dozen 
men,  who  gave  me  advice  and  explained  in 
whispers  the  finesse  of  the  game.  It  was 
hot  work,  for  the  men  sat  close  and  we  all 
smoked. 

I  also  learned  that  the  British  soldier, 
when  he  gives  his  mind  to  it,  plays  a  masterly 
game  of  draughts.  There  was  a  man — in 
civil  life  he  sailed  a  Thames  barge — who 
insulted  me  deeply  over  draughts.  He  used 
to  allow  me  to  win  one  game  in  three,  and  he 
managed  so  well  that  it  was  weeks  before 
I  found  out  what  he  was  doing. 

We  had  whist  drives,  and  once  a  billiard 


A  BACKWATER  225 

tournament,  run  on  what  I  believe  is  a  novel 
principle.  We  had  only  one  table,  half 
sized  and  very  dilapidated.  We  had  about 
thirty  entries.  We  gave  each  player  five 
minutes  and  let  him  score  as  much  as  he 
could  in  the  time,  no  opponent  interfering 
with  him.  The  highest  score  took  the 
prize. 

But  all  entertainments  and  games  in  that 
camp  were  liable  to  untimely  interruption. 
Messages  used  to  come  through  from  some 
remote  authority  demanding  stretcher- 
bearers.  Then,  though  it  were  in  the  midst 
of  a  game  of  whist,  every  man  present  had 
to  get  up  and  go  away. 

There  was  one  occasion  on  which  such  a 
summons  arrived  just  as  the  men  had 
assembled  to  welcome  a  concert  party. 
The  dining-room  was  empty  in  five  minutes. 
We  who  remained  were  faced  with  the 
prospect  of  a  concert  without  an  audience. 
But  our  sergeant-major  met  the  emergency. 
He  hurried  to  a  neighbouring  camp  and 
somehow  managed  to  borrow  two  hundred 
men.  The  concert  party  was  greatly  pleased, 
but  said  that  the  Emergency  Stretcher- 
bearers  did  not  look  as  old  and  dilapidated 
as  they  had  been  led  to  expect. 

There  came  a  time  when  the  camp  changed 
15 


226  A  BACKWATER 

and  many  old  friends  disappeared.  At  the 
beginning  of  the  Somme  battle  there  was  a 
sudden  demand  for  stretcher-bearers  to 
serve  at  the  advanced  dressing-stations. 
Almost  every  day  we  were  bidden  to  send 
men.  Little  parties  assembled  on  the  parade 
ground  and  marched  off  to  entrain  for  the 
front.  I  used  to  see  them  lined  up  on  the 
parade  ground,  war-battered  men,  who 
looked  old  though  they  were  young,  with 
their  kits  spread  out  for  inspection.  The 
least  unfit  went  first ;  but  indeed  there  was 
little  choice  among  them.  Not  a  man  of 
them  but  had  been  wounded  grievously  or 
mourned  a  constitution  broken  by  hardship. 
Yet  they  went  cheerfully,  patient  in  their 
dumb  devotion  to  duty,  hopeful  that  the 
final  victory  for  which  they  had  striven  in 
vain  was  near  at  hand  at  last. 

"  We'll  have  peace  before  Christmas." 
So  they  said  to  me  as  they  went. 

That  "  Peace  before  Christmas  "  !  It  has 
fluttered,  a  delusive  vision,  before  our  men 
since  the  start.  "  Is  it  true  that  the  cavalry 
are  through  ?  "  I  suppose  that  was  another 
delusion,  that  riding  down  of  a  flying  foe  by 
horsemen.  But  it  was  not  only  the  stretcher- 
bearers  who  clung  to  it. 

We  saw  our  friends  no  more  after  they 


A  BACKWATER  227 

disappeared  into  the  smoking  furnace  of 
the  front.  They  were  scattered  here  and 
there  among  the  dressing-stations  in  the 
fighting  area.  Many  of  them,  I  suppose, 
stayed  there,  struck  down  at  last,  ending 
their  days  in  France  as  they  began  them, 
with  the  sound  of  the  guns  in  their  ears. 
Others,  perhaps,  drifted  back  to  England 
more  hopelessly  broken  than  ever.  They 
must  be  walking  our  streets  now  with  silver 
badges  on  the  lapels  of  their  coats,  and  we, 
who  are  much  meaner  men,  should  take  our 
hats  off  to  them.  A  few  may  be  toiling 
still,  where  the  fighting  is  thickest,  the  last 
remnants  of  the  "  Old  Contemptibles." 

Their  places  in  the  camp  and  their  work 
on  the  quays  were  taken  by  others,  men 
disabled  or  broken  in  the  later  fights  when 
the  new  armies  won  their  glory.  The  char- 
acter of  the  camp  changed.  We  became 
more  respectable  than  we  were  in  the  old 
days.  No  one  any  longer  spoke  of  us  as  a 
"  bad  lot,"  or  called  us  "  a  tough  crowd." 
Perhaps  we  were  not  so  tough.  Certainly 
we  cannot  have  been  tougher  than  the  men 
who  made  good  in  those  first  terrific  days, 
who  continued  to  make  good  long  after  they 
could  fight  no  more,  staggering  through  the 
Somme  mud  with  laden  stretchers.  They 


228  A  BACKWATER 

grumbled  and  groused.     They  blasphemed 
constantly.     They  drank  when  they  could. 

They    wanted    no    " parson "    among 

them.      But  they  were   men,  unconquered 
and  unconquerable. 


CHAPTER  XV 

MY   THIRD    CAMP 

AT  the  front,  the  actual  front  where  the 
fighting  is,  imagination  runs  riot  in  devising 
place  names,  and  military  maps  recognise 
woods,  hills,  and  roads  by  their  new  titles. 
At  the  bases  a  severer  spirit  holds  sway. 
I  recollect  one  curious  and  disagreeable 
camp  which  was  called,  colloquially  and 
officially,  Cinder  City.  Otherwise  camps 
were  known  by  numbers  or  at  best  by  the 
French  names  of  the  districts  in  which  they 
were  situated.  I  thought  I  had  hit  on 
another  exception  to  this  rule  when  I  first 
heard  of  this  camp.  It  seemed  natural 
to  have  called  a  camp  after  one  of  our 
generals.  In  fact  nothing  of  the  sort  oc- 
curred. It  was  the  French  name  for  the 
place.  We  took  over  the  name  when  we 
pitched  our  tents. 

Indeed   the  camp   was    not    the    sort    of 
place   which  gets   a  name  given  to  it.     It 

229 


230  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

is  only  places  which  somebody  loves  or 
hates,  in  which  somebody  is  one  way  or 
other  interested,  which  get  new  names 
given  them.  Nobody,  or  nobody  in  high 
authority,  took  an  interest  in  this  camp. 
It  was  a  stepchild  among  camps,  neither 
attractive  enough  to  be  loved  nor  dis- 
agreeable enough  to  be  hated  and  reviled. 

With  a  string  of  other  dull  camps,  it 
was  under  the  command  of  a  colonel 
who,  having  much  on  his  mind  besides 
the  care  of  this  camp,  lived  elsewhere. 
Only  one  officer  slept  in  the  camp.  He 
had  a  bedroom  which  was  half  office, 
decorated — he  several  times  assured  me  that 
his  predecessor  was  responsible  for  the 
decoration — with  pictures  from  La  Vie 
Parisienne.  The  proprietors  of  that  journal 
must  have  profited  enormously  by  the  coming 
of  the  British  military  force.  If  there  is 
any  form  of  taxation  of  excess  profits  in 
France  that  editor  must  be  paying  heavily. 
Yet  the  paper  is  sufficiently  monotonous, 
and  it  is  difficult  to  imagine  that  any  one 
wants  to  take  it  in  regularly. 

Except  this  bedroom,  the  officer  in  com- 
mand had  no  habitation  in  the  camp. 
He  messed  elsewhere  and,  as  was  natural, 
spent  his  spare  time  elsewhere.  He 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  231 

did  all  he  could  for  the  camp,  but  he 
could  not  do  very  much.  He  was  of  sub- 
ordinate rank  and  of  no  great  military 
importance.  It  was  very  difficult  to  stir 
the  authorities  to  any  great  interest  in 
the  camp.  There  was  a  certain  amount 
of  excuse  for  them.  It  never  seemed  worth 
while  to  take  much  trouble  for  the  men 
there.  The  function  of  the  camp  was 
peculiar.  Men  were  drafted  into  it  from 
convalescent  camps  and  hospitals  when  they 
were  passed  "fit,"  and  were  ready  to  rejoin 
their  units.  The  business  of  the  camp 
authorities  was  to  sort  the  men  out,  divide 
them  into  parties,  and  dispatch  them  to  the 
depots  of  their  regiments. 

Every  day  men  came  into  camp  and  were 
for  the  moment  "  details."  They  belonged 
to  all  possible  regiments  and  branches  of  the 
service.  Every  day  parties  of  men  left  the 
camp  for  the  different  base  depots.  At 
10  a.m.  the  H.  party  for  H.,  at  12  noon 
the  E.  party  for  E.,  no  longer  "  details," 
but  drafts  consigned  to  their  proper  depots 
at  H.,  E.,  or  elsewhere.  Their  stay  in 
the  camp  was  usually  very  brief.  It  was 
scarcely  worth  while  trying  to  make  them 
comfortable  or  doing  anything  to  make  life 
pleasant  for  them. 


232  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

It  was,  I  think,  rather  hard  on  men  to 
be  sent  straight  from  the  comfort  and  warmth 
of  a  hospital  or  convalescent  camp  to  a 
place  as  Spartan  as  this.  Instead  of  having 
a  bed  to  sleep  on,  the  unfortunate  "  detail " 
found  himself  condemned  to  the  floor  boards 
of  a  bell  tent,  with  a  very  meagre  allow- 
ance of  well-worn  blankets.  In  cold  weather 
the  change  was  abrupt  and  trying,  but  of 
course  it  had  to  be  made  sooner  or  later, 
and  I  suppose  the  men  had  no  reasonable 
excuse  for  grumbling. 

Very  much  harder  on  them  was  the  lack 
of  accommodation  in  the  camp.  Things 
are  much  better  now  in  this  respect ;  but 
when  I  knew  the  camp  first,  there  was  no 
recreation  room  except  a  small  and  incon- 
venient E.F.  Canteen. 

The  Y.M.C.A.  never  established  itself 
there.  The  Church  Army  put  up  a  small 
hut,  but  sent  no  worker  to  look  after  it ; 
and  even  that  hut  was  not  opened  till  the 
early  summer  of  1916.  By  a  curious  chance 
the  E.F.  Canteen  was  worked  by  ladies  instead 
of  the  usual  orderlies.  The  ladies  were  in 
fact  there,  running  a  small  independent 
canteen,  before  the  E.F.  Canteen  took  over 
the  place.  Rather  unwillingly,  I  think, 
the  E.F.  Canteen  people  took  over  these 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  233 

ladies.     It  was  a  most  fortunate  thing  that 
they  did  so. 

Miss  L.,  the  head  of  this  little  band  of 
workers,  was  a  lady  of  unusual  ability,  energy, 
and  sympathy.  I  have  said  that  no  one 
in  authority  cared  for  the  camp.  Miss  L., 
who  had  no  military  authority,  not  only 
cared  for  it— she  loved  it.  It  was  to  her 
and  her  assistants  that  the  camp  owed  most 
of  what  was  done  for  it.  I  have  seen  much 
splendid  work  done  by  our  voluntary  ladies 
in  France,  but  I  have  never  seen  better  work 
done  under  more  difficult  circumstances 
than  was  done  by  these  ladies. 

I  suppose  it  is  foolish  to  be  surprised  at 
any  evidence  of  the  blatant  vulgarity  of  the 
men  who  earn  their  living  by  the  horrid 
trade  of  politics.  They  speak  and  act  after 
their  kind ;  and  it  is  probably  true  that 
silk  purses  cannot  be  made  out  of  sows'  ears. 
Yet  I  own  to  having  experienced  a  shock 
when  Mr.  Macpherson  in  the  House  of 
Commons  described  our  lady  workers  as 
"  camp  followers."  Even  for  a  politician, 
even  in  the  House  of  Commons,  that  was 
bad. 

Miss  L.  and  her  assistants  had  no  great 
organisation  behind  them  to  which  they 
could  appeal,  which  would  take  their  part 


234  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

and  fight  their  battles.  Like  the  men  they 
worked  for,  they  were  "  details."  The  E.F. 
Canteen  authorities,  who  employed  but  did 
not  pay  them,  looked  upon  those  ladies  with 
suspicion.  They  were  allowed  to  work. 
They  were  not  welcomed.  I  think  the 
E.F.  Canteen  people  would  have  got  rid 
of  them  if  they  could.  Yet  they  did  work 
which  in  quantity  was  at  least  equal  to 
that  of  the  orderlies  usually  employed,  and 
in  quality  enormously  superior. 

The  room  which  served  as  a  canteen  was 
singularly  inconvenient.  The  part  of  it  used 
by  the  men  was  far  too  small,  and  used  to  be 
disagreeably  crowded  in  the  evenings  and  on 
wet  days.  The  space  behind  the  counter 
was  narrow,  gloomy,  and  ill  ventilated.  A 
worker  serving  there  had  the  choice  of  being 
half  choked  or  blown  about  by  furious 
draughts.  Miss  L.  preferred  the  draughts, 
which  she  called  "  fresh  air."  I  sometimes 
found  myself  inclined  to  regard  suffocation 
as  the  pleasanter  alternative. 

I  have  never  seen  a  more  inconvenient 
kitchen  than  that  in  which  those  ladies 
worked.  It  was  small,  low,  and  very  gloomy. 
It  had  an  uneven  floor,  on  which  it  was 
quite  possible  to  trip.  The  roof  leaked 
badly  in  half  a  dozen  places,  and  on  wet 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  285 

days  an  incautious  person  splashed  about. 
In  summer  with  two  fires  burning  that 
kitchen  became  fiercely  hot.  Even  an 
electric  fan,  presented  by  a  sympathetic 
visitor,  did  little  to  help.  No  self-respecting 
English  kitchen  maid  would  have  stayed  two 
hours  in  a  house  where  she  was  given  such 
a  kitchen  to  work  in. 

Yet  wonderful  hot  suppers  were  cooked 
there  in  long  succession.  Huge  puddings 
and  deep  crocks  of  stewed  fruit  were  pre- 
pared. A  constant  supply  of  tea,  coffee, 
and  cocoa  was  kept  ready  to  replenish 
exhausted  kettles  on  the  counter  outside, 
and  all  the  washing  up  for  hundreds  of  men 
was  done  in  a  very  small  sink. 

The  cooking  and  bar  serving  were  the 
smallest  part  of  the  work  those  ladies  did. 
Miss  L.  was  active  as  a  gardener.  In  most 
camps  in  France  men  take  to  gardening 
willingly,  and  require  little  help  or  encourage- 
ment. In  this  camp  it  was  different. 
No  one  stayed  there  long  enough  to  be 
interested  in  the  garden.  I  have  seen  photo- 
graphs of  the  camp  before  I  knew  it,  as  it 
was  in  1915,  a  desolate  stretch  of  trampled 
mud.  I  saw  recently  a  photograph  of  the 
camp  in  1917.  It  was  then  gay  with  flowers. 
I  knew  it  in  1916,  when  Miss  L.  had  begun 


236  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

her  gardening  and  was  gradually  extending 
her  flower-beds,  creating  new  borders  and 
fencing  off  small  spaces  of  waste  ground 
with  wooden  palings. 

Her  enthusiasm  stimulated  men,  who  could 
never  hope  to  see  any  result  of  their  labours, 
to  do  something  for  the  camp.  One  man, 
a  miner  from  Northumberland,  set  out  the 
name  of  the  camp  in  large  letters  done  in 
white  stones  on  a  green  bank  behind  the 
canteen.  He  gave  all  his  spare  time  for 
two  days  to  the  work,  and  when  he  had 
finished  we  discovered  that  he  had  left 
out  a  letter  in  the  first  syllable  of  the 
name.  He  was  a  patient  as  well  as  an 
enthusiastic  man.  He  began  all  over  again. 

Miss  L.  went  to  great  trouble  in  providing 
amusements  for  the  men.  Here  she  worked 
against  great  difficulties.  An  organisation 
like  the  Y.M.C.A.  has  control  of  concert 
parties  and  lecturers  who  are  sent  round  to 
various  huts,  thus  greatly  lightening  the 
labour  of  the  local  workers.  The  camp 
canteen  had  no  organisation  behind  it, 
and  could  command  no  ready-made  enter- 
tainments. In  the  sweat  of  our  brows  we 
earned  such  concerts  as  we  had,  and  any 
one  who  has  ever  got  up  a  concert,  even 
at  home,  knows  how  much  sweating  such 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  237 

activities  involve.  In  the  end,  moved  by 
pity  at  our  plight,  the  Y.M.C.A.  people 
used  to  lend  us  concert  parties,  especially 
"  Lena  Ashwell "  parties,  the  best  of  their 
kind.  I  have  always  found  the  Y.M.C.A. 
generous  in  sharing  their  good  things  with 
those  outside  their  organisation. 

Another  difficulty  which  faced  Miss  L. 
was  the  want  of  any  suitable  place  for  enter- 
tainments. The  canteen  was  far  too  small. 
The  Church  Army  hut,  when  we  had  got  it 
opened,  was  a  little  better,  but  still  not 
nearly  large  enough  for  the  audience  which 
a  good  concert  party  drew.  We  had  to  use 
the  dining-hall.  It  was  not  always  available 
and  was  seldom  available  at  the  exact  time 
we  wanted  it.  It  had  no  stage  and  no  piano. 
Each  time  a  concert  was  held  there,  a  stage 
had  to  be  erected  for  the  occasion,  the 
piano  hauled  over  from  the  canteen,  and  some 
kind  of  decoration  arranged. 

One  of  the  minor  inconveniences  of 
the  camp  was  the  extraordinary  uncertainty 
of  the  lighting.  Other  camps,  even  the 
Con.  Camp  occasionally,  suffered  from  failure 
of  the  supply  of  electricity.  For  some 
reason  the  thing  happened  more  often  in 
this  camp  than  elsewhere ;  and  even  when 
the  current  was  running  strongly  we  found 


238  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

ourselves  in  darkness  because  our  wires  fused 
in  places  difficult  to  get  at,  or  branches 
fell  from  trees  and  broke  wires.  We  got 
accustomed  to  these  disasters  when  they 
happened  at  ordinary  times. 

Miss  L.  and  her  assistants  were  ladies  of 
resource  and  indomitable  spirit.  It  was  a 
small  thing  to  them  to  find  the  canteen 
suddenly  plunged  into  total  darkness  while 
a  crowd  -of  men  was  clamouring  for  food 
and  drink  at  the  counter.  A  supply  of 
candles  was  kept  ready  to  hand.  They  were 
placed  in  mugs  (candlesticks  were  lacking 
of  course)  and  set  on  the  counter.  By  the 
aid  of  their  feeble  gleam  the  ladies  groped 
their  way  into  the  kitchen  for  tea,  filled 
cups,  and  counted  out  change.  The  scene 
always  reminded  me  of  Gideon's  attack  on 
the  Midianites  when  his  soldiers  carried 
lamps  in  pitchers.  Occasionally  some  one 
knocked  over  a  mug.  There  was  a  crash 
and  a  blaze,  a  very  fair  imitation  of  the 
battle  in  the  Book  of  Judges. 

It  was  worse  when  a  whist  drive  or  a 
singing  competition  in  the  Church  Army 
hut  was  interrupted  by  one  of  these  Egyptian 
plagues  of  darkness.  But  even  then  we 
did  not  allow  ourselves  to  be  seriously 
embarrassed.  The  men,  responsive  to  the 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  239 

instinct  of  discipline,  sat  quiet  at  the  whist 
tables  with  their  cards  in  their  hands.  The 
glow  of  burning  cigarettes  could  be  seen, 
faint  spots  of  light ;  nothing  else. 

Miss  L.  hurried  to  the  canteen  for  candles. 
They  were  set  in  pools  of  their  own  grease 
on  the  tables  and  the  games  went  on.  A 
singing  competition  scarcely  even  paused. 
The  competitors  sang  on.  The  pianist  man- 
aged to  play.  The  audience  applauded  with 
extra  vigour  until  candles  were  brought 
and  set  in  rows,  like  footlights,  in  front  of 
the  stage. 

Our  worst  experience  of  light  failure  oc- 
curred one  evening  when  we  had  a  visit 
from  a  very  superior  concert  party.  We 
had  secured  it  only  after  much  "  wangling." 
We  made  every  possible  preparation  for  its 
reception.  One  of  Miss  L.'s  assistants  drew 
out  a  most  attractive  advertisement  of  the 
performance  with  a  picture  of  a  beauti- 
ful lady  in  a  red  dress  at  the  top  of  it. 
We  posted  this  up  in  various  parts  of 
the  camp ;  but  we  were  not  really  anxious 
about  the  audience.  It  always  "  rolled 
up." 

We  set  up  a  stage  in  the  dining-room,  a 
large  high  stage  made  out  of  dining-tables, 
a  little  rickety,  but  considered  by  good 


240  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

judges  to  be  fairly  safe.  We  spread  a 
carpet,  or  something  which  looked  like  a 
carpet,  on  it.  Only  Miss  L.  could  have 
got  a  carpet  in  the  camp,  and  I  do  not 
know  how  she  did  it.  We  hung  up  a  large 
Union  Jack,  Miss  L.'s  private  property, 
which  was  used  on  all  festive  occasions 
and  served  as  an  altar  cloth  on  Sundays. 
The  E.F.  Canteen  authorities  were  worried 
for  a  week  beforehand,  and,  lest  they  should 
be  worried  more,  promised  us  a  new  piano, 
"  same,"  so  they  put  it,  "  to  be  delivered  " 
in  time  for  the  concert.  The  promise  was 
not  kept. 

That  was  our  first  misfortune.  With  deep 
misgiving  we  dragged  our  own  piano  out 
of  the  canteen  and  set  it  on  the  stage. 
The  musical  members  of  Miss  L.'s  staff 
assured  us  that  it  was  desperately  out  of 
tune.  The  least  musical  of  us  could  assure 
ourselves  that  several  notes  made  no  sound 
at  all,  however  hard  you  hit  them.  And 
the  concert  party  was  a  very  grand  one. 

It  arrived  in  two  motors,  and  we  abased 
ourselves  before  it,  babbling  apologies.  One 
after  another  the  members  of  the  party 
approached  our  piano  and  poked  at  it  with 
their  forefingers.  One  after  another  they 
turned  away  looking  depressed.  The  only 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  241 

one  of  them  who  remained  moderately  cheer- 
ful was  a  man  who  did  conjuring  tricks. 
It  was,  I  imagine,  through  his  good  offices 
that  the  party  agreed  to  attempt  its  pro- 
gramme. 

The  audience,  who  knew  the  failings  of 
our  piano  as  well  as  we  did,  applauded  the 
first  song  rapturously.  Then  without  the 
slightest  warning  every  lamp  in  the  place 
went  out.  A  dog,  a  well-beloved  creature 
called  Detail,  who  was  accustomed  to  sit 
under  Miss  L.'s  chair  at  concerts,  began  to 
bark  furiously.  That,  I  think,  was  what 
finally  broke  the  temper  of  the  concert 
party.  We  had  an  oil  lamp  ready  for  emer- 
gencies. It  was  lit,  and  I  saw  the  leader  of 
the  party  beckoning  to  me.  His  face  was 
fearfully  stern.  I  fully  expected  him  to 
say  that  the  whole  party  would  leave  at 
once. 

But  he  did  nothing  so  drastic.  He  de- 
manded the  instant  expulsion  of  Detail. 
There  was  a  scuffle  at  the  far  end  of  the 
room.  The  audience  rose  to  its  feet  and 
cheered  tumultuously.  Detail,  I  am  sorry 
to  say,  barked  again.  I  saw  eight  men 
staggering  through  the  crowded  room  bearing 
a  piano.  It  was  quite  new,  and,  I  am  told, 
almost  in  tune.  The  situation  was  saved, 
16 


242  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

The  singers  were  mollified  and  went  on 
with  their  programme  by  the  light  of  one 
lamp,  two  candles  (on  the  piano),  and 
three  stable  lanterns.  An  orderly  with  a 
screwdriver  and  a  box  of  matches  sought 
for  the  fused  wire.  Detail  crept  under  her 
mistress's  chair  again  unrebuked.  She  was 
an  animal  of  cultivated  tastes  and  hated 
missing  concerts.  She  usually  behaved  with 
decorum,  not  barking  except  by  way  of 
applause  when  the  audience  shouted  and 
noise  of  any  kind  was  legitimate. 

The  camp  is,  I  am  told,  very  different 
now.  There  is  a  new  canteen,  large,  well 
furnished,  and  beautiful.  Concerts  can 
be  held  in  it  and  church  services.  No 
one  is  any  longer  crowded  out  of  any- 
thing. The  kitchen  is  a  spacious  place  in 
which  it  is  possible  to  cook  without  great 
physical  suffering.  There  are  more  flower- 
beds, well-kept  lines  between  the  tents,  an 
impressive  entrance.  No  doubt  even  the 
electric  light  shines  consistently.  The  days 
of  makeshift  are  over  and  the  camp  is  a 
credit  to  the  Expeditionary  Force. 

But  I  should  not  like  to  go  back  there 
again.  I  should  be  haunted  with  memories 
of  old  days  which  were  trying  but  pleasant. 
J  should  wish  myself  back  at  one  of  the 


MY    THIRD    CAMP  243 

cheery  tea-parties  in  the  old  canteen  kitchen, 
when  we  sat  on  packing-cases  and  biscuit- 
boxes,  when  we  shifted  our  seats  about 
to  dodge  the  raindrops  from  the  roof, 
when  we  drank  out  of  three  cracked 
cups  and  thick  mugs  borrowed  from  the 
canteen. 

I  should  remember  pay-nights  when  the 
men  stood  before  the  counter  in  a  dense 
mob,  all  hungry,  each  holding  in  his  hand 
a  five-franc  note,  when  we  had  no  change, 
not  a  franc,  not  a  sou;  when,  in  despera- 
tion, I  used  to  volunteer  to  collect  change 
from  any  one  who  had  it,  giving  chits  in 
exchange  for  small  coins.  Such  crises  do 
not  arise  now,  I  suppose. 

Sitting  in  comfort  at  a  table  in  the  fine 
new  canteen  I  should  remember  sadly  a  wet 
afternoon  in  the  Church  Army  hut  when 
there  was  no  room  to  move  and  the  air  was 
heavy  with  Woodbine  smoke  and  the  steam 
of  drying  cloth,  when  I  perched  on  the 
corner  of  a  window-sill  and  pitted  myself 
against  a  chess  player  who  challenged  me 
suddenly  and  turned  out  to  be  a  master  of 
the  game  and  the  secretary  of  a  chess  club 
in  Yorkshire. 

I  should  remember,  with  how  great  regret ! 
how,  evening  after  evening,  Miss  S.  left  her 


244  MY    THIRD    CAMP 

pots  and  pans,  smoothed  her  tousled  over- 
all, and  came  over  to  the  Church  Army  hut 
to  play  a  hymn  for  us  at  evening  prayers; 
how  the  men,  an  ever-changing  congregation, 
chose  the  same  hymns  night  after  night  till 
we  came  to  hate  the  sound  of  their  tunes ; 
how  we,  reserving  Sunday  evenings  for  our 
property,  chose  the  hymn  then  and  always 
chose  the  same  one — which  I  shall  never  sing 
again  without  remembering  Miss  S.  at  the 
piano,  smelling  the  air  of  that  hut,  and  being 
troubled  by  a  vision  of  the  faces  of  the  men 
who  sang. 

I  should  not  find  Miss  S.  there  if  I  went 
back,  or  Captain  L.,  or  any  one,  almost, 
whom  I  knew.  No  doubt  their  successors 
are  doing  well,  mine  better  than  ever  I  did, 
which  would  be  no  difficult  thing ;  but  I 
could  not  bear  to  see  them  at  their  work. 
Ghosts  of  old  days  would  haunt  me. 

And  worst  of  all,  Miss  L.  is  gone.  The 
rest  of  us  have  passed  and  no  one  misses 
us  much,  I  suppose.  Our  places  are  easily 
filled.  Her  place  in  that  camp  no  one  will 
ever  quite  fill.  "  Many  daughters  have  done 
virtuously,  but  thou  excellest  them  all." 


CHAPTER  XVI 

LEAVE 

AT  last !  I  have  the  precious  paper  safe 
in  my  hand,  in  my  pocket  with  a  button 
fastened  tight  to  keep  it  there  :  my  leave 
warrant,  passport  to  ten  days'  liberty,  rest, 
and — other  things  much  more  desirable  than 
liberty  or  rest.  It  is  issued  to  me  late  on 
Sunday  night  for  a  start  on  Monday  morning. 
The  authorities  are  desperately  suspicious. 
They  trust  no  man's  honour.  They  treat 
even  a  padre  as  if  he  were  a  fraudulent 
cashier,  bent  on  cheating  them  if  he  can. 
I  do  not  blame  them.  In  this  matter  of 
leave  every  man  is  a  potential  swindler. 
A  bishop  would  cheat  if  he  could.  If  I  had 
got  that  leave  warrant  an  hour  or  two  sooner 
than  I  did,  I  should  have  made  a  push  for 
the  boat  which  left  on  Sunday  evening. 
Thereby  I  should  have  deprived  the  army 
of  my  services  during  the  night,  a  form  of 
swindling  not  to  be  tolerated,  though  what 

245 


246  LEAVE 

use  I  am  to  the  army  or  any  one  else  when 
I  am  in  bed  and  asleep  it  would  be  very 
difficult  to  say. 

All  that  night  the  wind  shrieked,  rattling 
windows  to  the  discomfort  of  those  who  were 
lucky  enough  to  have  roofs  over  their  heads, 
threatening  the  dwellers  in  tents  with  the 
utter  destruction  of  their  shelters.  Very 
early,  before  the  dawn  of  the  winter  morn- 
ing, the  rain  began,  not  to  fall — the  rain  in 
a  full  gale  of  wind  does  not  fall — but  to 
sweep  furiously  across  the  town. 

I  heard  it,  but  I  did  not  care.  I  turned 
and  snuggled  close  under  my  blankets.  In 
an  hour  or  twro  it  would  be  time  to  get  up. 
My  day  would  begin,  the  glorious  first  day 
of  leave.  What  does  rain  matter  ?  or  what 
do  gales  matter  ?  unless — a  horrid  fear 
assailed  me.  Was  it  possible  that  in  such 
a  gale  the  steamer  would  fail  to  start.  I 
turned  and  twisted,  tortured  by  the  thought. 
Every  time  the  windows  rattled  and  the 
house  shook  I  sweated  hot  and  cold. 

In  the  end,  tormented  beyond  endurance, 
I  got  up  and  dressed  some  time  between 
5  a.m.  and  6  a.m.  I  did  more.  Without 
the  coffee  which  Madame  had  promised  me 
I  sallied  forth  and  tramped  through  the 
deserted  streets  of  the  town,  fording  gutter^ 


LEAVE  247 

which  were  brooks,  skirting  close  by  walls 
which  promised  what  sailors  call  a  "  lee." 

The  long  stretch  of  the  quay  was  desolate. 
Water  lay  in  deep  pools  between  the  railway 
lines  among  the  sleepers.  Water  trickled 
from  deserted  waggons  and  fell  in  small 
cascades  from  the  roofs  of  sheds.  The 
roadway,  crossed  and  recrossed  by  the  rail- 
way, had  little  muddy  lakes  on  it  and  broad 
stretches  of  mud  rather  thicker  than  the 
water  of  the  lakes. 

Far  down  the  quay  lay  a  steamer  with  two 
raking  funnels — the  leave  boat,  the  ship  of 
heart's  desire  for  many  men.  Clouds  of 
smoke,  issuing  defiantly  from  her  funnels, 
were  immediately  swept  sideways  by  the 
wind  and  beaten  down  by  the  rain.  The 
smoke  ceased  to  be  smoke,  became  a  duller 
greyness  added  to  the  greyness  of  the  air, 
dissolved  into  smuts  and  was  carried  to 
earth — or  to  the  faces  and  hands  of  way- 
farers— by  the  rain. 

Already  at  7  o'clock  there  were  men 
going  along  the  quay — a  steady  stream  of 
them,  tramping,  splashing,  stumbling  to- 
wards the  steamer.  In  the  matter  of  the 
sailing  of  leave  boats  rumour  is  the  sole 
informant,  and  rumour  had  it  that  this  boat 
would  start  at  10  a.m.  Leave  is  a  precious 


248  LEAVE 

thing.  He  takes  no  risks  who  has  secured 
the  coveted  pass  to  Blighty.  It  is  a  small 
matter  to  wait  three  hours  on  a  rain-swept 
quay.  It  would  be  a  disaster  beyond 
imagining  to  miss  the  boat. 

Officers  make  for  the  boat  in  twos  or 
threes,  their  trench  coats,  buttoned  tightly, 
flap  round  putteed  or  gaitered  legs.  Drenched 
haversacks  hang  from  their  shoulders. 

Parties  of  men,  fully  burdened  with  rifles 
and  kit,  march  down  from  the  rest  camp 
where  they  have  spent  the  night.  The  mud 
of  the  trenches  is  still  thick  on  them.  One 
here  and  there  wears  his  steel  helmet.  They 
carry  all  sorts  of  strange  packages,  sacks 
tied  at  the  mouth,  parcels  sewed  up  in 
sacking,  German  helmets  slung  on  knapsacks, 
valueless  trophies  of  battlefields,  loot  from 
captured  dug-outs,  pathetically  foolish  sou- 
venirs bought  in  French  shops,  all  to  be 
presented  to  the  wives,  mothers,  sweethearts 
who  wait  at  home. 

A  couple  of  army  sisters,  lugging  suit- 
cases, clinging  to  the  flying  folds  of  their 
grey  cloaks,  walk,  bent  forward  against  the 
wind  and  rain.  A  blue-coated  Canadian 
nurse,  brass  stars  on  her  shoulder  straps, 
has  given  an  arm  to  a  V.A.D.  girl,  a  creature 
already  terrified  at  the  prospect  of  crossing 


LEAVE  249 

the  sea  on  such  a  day.  The  rain  streams 
down  their  faces,  but  perhaps  Canadians 
are  accustomed  to  worse  rain  in  their  own 
country.  Certainly  this  young  woman  does 
not  seem  to  mind  it.  She  is  smiling  and 
walks  jauntily.  Like  many  of  our  cousins 
from  overseas  she  is  rich  in  splendid  vitality. 

A  heavy  grey  motor  rushes  along,  splashing 
the  walkers.  Beside  the  driver  is  a  pile  of 
luggage.  Inside,  secure  behind  plate  glass 
from  any  weather,  sits  a  general.  Another 
motor  follows  and  still  others.  British  staff 
officers  and  military  attaches  from  allied 
nations,  the  privileged  classes  of  the  war, 
sweep  by  while  humbler  men  splash  and 
stumble. 

But  in  front  of  the  gangway  of  the  leave 
boat,  as  at  the  gates  of  Paradise,  there  is  no 
distinction  of  persons.  The  mean  man  and 
the  mighty  find  the  same  treatment  there. 
There  comes  a  moment  when  the  car  must 
be  left,  when  crossed  sword  and  baton  on 
the  shoulder  straps  avail  their  wearer  no 
more  than  a  single  star. 

A  sailor,  relentless  as  Rhadamanthus, 
stands  on  the  gangway  and  bars  the  way  to 
the  shelter  of  the  ship.  No  one — so  the  order 
has  gone  forth — is  to  be  allowed  on  board 
before  9  o'clock.  There  is  shelter  a  few 


250  LEAVE 

yards  behind,  a  shed.  A  few  seek  it.  I 
prefer  to  stand,  with  other  early  comers, 
in  a  cluster  round  the  end  of  the  gangway, 
determined,  though  we  wait  hours,  to  be 
among  the  first  on  board. 

The  crowd  grows  denser  as  time  goes  on. 
The  Canadian  sister,  alert  and  competent, 
secures  a  seat  on  the  rail  of  a  disused  gang- 
way and  plants  two  neat  feet  on  the  rail 
opposite.  An  Australian  captain,  gallant 
amid  extreme  adversity,  offers  the  spare 
waterproof  he  carries  to  the  shivering  V.A.D. 
I  find  myself  wedged  tight  against  a  general. 
He  is  elderly,  grizzled,  and  looks  fierce ;  but 
he  accepts  a  light  for  his  cigarette  from  the 
bowl  of  my  pipe.  It  was  his  only  chance  of 
getting  a  light  then  and  there.  Now  and 
then  some  one  asks  a  neighbour  whether  it 
is  -ikely  that  the  boat  will  start  on  such  a 
day. 

A  depressed  major  on  the  outskirts  of 
the  crowd  says  that  he  has  it  on  the  best 
authority  that  the  port  is  closed  and  that 
there  will  be  no  sailings  for  a  week.  The 
news  travels  from  mouth  to  mouth,  but  no 
one  stirs.  There  is  a  horrid  possibility  that 
it  may  be  true  ;  but — well,  most  men  know 
the  reputation  of  that  "  best  authority." 
He  is  the  kind  of  liar  of  whose  fate  St.  John 


LEAVE  251 

speaks  vigorously  in  the  last  chapter  but 
one  of  his  Apocalypse. 

The  ship  rises  slowly  higher  and  higher, 
for  the  tide  is  flowing.  The  gangway  grows 
steeper.  From  time  to  time  two  sailors 
shift  it  slightly,  retying  the  ropes  which 
fasten  it  to  the  ship's  rail.  The  men  on 
the  quay  watch  the  manoeuvre  hopefully. 

At  9  o'clock  an  officer  appears  on  the 
outside  fringe  of  the  crowd.  With  a  civility 
which  barely  cloaks  his  air  of  patronage 
he  demands  way  for  himself  to  the  ship. 
His  brassard  wins  him  all  he  asks  at  once. 
On  it  are  the  letters  "  A.M.L.O."  He  is  the 
Assistant  Military  Landing  Officer,  and  for 
the  moment  is  lord  of  all,  the  arbiter  of 
things  more  important  than  life  and  death. 
In  private  life  he  is  perhaps  a  banker's  clerk 
or  an  insurance  agent.  On  the  battlefield 
his  rank  entitles  him  to  such  consideration 
only  as  is  due  to  a  captain.  Here  he  may 
ignore  colonels,  may  say  to  a  brigadier, 
"Stop  pushing."  He  has -what  all  desire, 
the  "  Open  Sesame  "  which  clears  the  way 
to  the  ship. 

He  goes  on  board,  acknowledging  with 
careless  grace  the  salute  of  one  of  the  ship's 
officers.  He  stands  on  the  shelter  deck. 

With  calm  dignity  he  surveys  the  swaying 


252  LEAVE 

crowd  beneath  him.  "  There's  no  hurry, 
gentlemen,"  he  says.  There  is  no  hurry 
for  him.  He  has  risen  from  his  bed  at  a 
reasonable  hour,  has  washed,  shaved,  bathed, 
breakfasted.  He  has  not  stood  for  hours  in 
drenching  rain.  The  look  of  him  is  too 
much  for  the  general  who  is  wedged  beside 
me  in  the  crowd.  He  speaks  : 

"  What  the ?     Why  the ?      When 

the ?     Where  the-   -?"     He  is  a  man 

of  fluent  speech,  this  general.  I  thought  as 
much  when  I  first  looked  at  him.  Now  it 
seems  that  his  command  of  language  is  a 
great  gift,  more  valuable  than  the  eloquence 
of  statesmen  or  the  music  of  poets.  The 
Canadian  sister  leads  the  applause  of  the 
crowd.  The  general  turns  to  me  with  a 
deprecating  smile. 

"  Excuse  me,  padre,  but  really " 

The  army  respects  the  Church,  knows  that 
certain  necessary  forms  of  speech  are  not 
suited  to  clerical  ears.  But  the  Church  is 
human  and  can  sympathise  with  men's 
infirmities. 

"  If  I  were  a  general,"  I  said,  "  I  should 
say  a  lot  more." 

The  general,  encouraged  by  this  absolution, 
does  say  more.  He  mentions  the  fact  that 
he  is  going  straight  to  the  War  Office  when 


LEAVE  253 

he  reaches  London.  Once  there  he  will — 
the  threat  vaporises  into  jets  of  language 
so  terrific  that  the  air  round  us  grows 
sensibly  warmer.  I  notice  that  the  V.A.D. 
is  holding  tight  to  the  hand  of  the  Canadian 
sister. 

The  A.M.L.O.,  peering  through  the  rain 
from  the  shelter  deck  of  the  steamer,  recog- 
nises the  rank  of  his  assailant.  The  mention 
of  the  War  Office  reaches  him.  He  wilts 
visibly.  The  stiffness  goes  out  of  him  before 
the  delighted  eyes  of  the  crowd.  He  admits 
us  to  the  ship.  Another  gangway  is  lowered. 
In  two  thin  streams  the  damp  men  and 
draggled  women  struggle  on  board.  Certain 
officers,  the  more  helpless  subalterns  among 
us,  are  detailed  for  duty  on  the  voyage. 
They  parade  on  the  upper  deck.  To  them 
at  least  the  A.M.L.O.  can  still  speak  with 
authority.  He  explains  to  the  bewildered 
youths  what  their  duties  are.  Each 
passenger,  so  it  appears,  must  wear  a  life- 
belt. It  is  the  business  of  the  subalterns 
to  see  that  every  one  ties  round  his  chest 
one  of  those  bandoliers  of  cork. 

On  the  leave  boat  the  spirit  of  democracy 
is  triumphant.  Sergeants  jostle  commis- 
sioned officers.  Subalterns  seize  deck  chairs 
desired  by  colonels  of  terrific  dignity.  Pri- 


254  LEAVE 

vates  with  muddy  trousers  crowd  the  sofas 
of  the  first-class  saloon.  Discipline  we  may 
suppose  survives.  If  peril  threatened,  men 
would  fall  into  their  proper  places  and  words 
of  command  would  be  obeyed.  But  the 
outward  forms  of  discipline  are  for  a  time 
in  abeyance.  The  spirit  of  goodfellowship 
prevails.  The  common  joy — an  intensified 
form  of  the  feeling  of  the  schoolboy  on  the 
first  day  of  the  Christmas  holidays — makes 
one  family  of  all  ranks  and  ages. 

No  doubt  also  the  sea  insists  on  the 
recognition  of  new  standards  of  worth.  The 
humblest  private  who  is  not  seasick  is  visibly 
and  unmistakably  a  better  man  than  a 
field- marshal  with  his  head  over  the  bulwarks. 
Curious  and  ill-assorted  groups  are  formed. 
Men  who  at  other  times  would  not  speak 
to  each  other  are  drawn  and  even  squeezed 
together  by  the  pressure  of  circumstance. 

Between  two  of  the  deckhouses  on  the 
lower  deck  of  this  steamer  is  a  narrow  pass- 
age. Porters  have  packed  valises  and  other 
luggage  into  it.  It  is  sheltered  from  the 
rain  and  will  be  secure  from  showers  of 
flying  spray.  Careless  and  inexperienced 
travellers,  searching  along  the  crowded  decks 
for  somewhere  to  sit  down,  pass  this  place 
by  unnoticed.  Others,  accustomed  in  old 


LEAVE  255 

days  to  luxurious  travelling,   scorn  it   and 
seek  for  comfort  which  they  never  find. 

I  come  on  this  nook  by  accident ;  and  at 
once  perceive  its  value  as  a  place  of  shelter 
and  refuge.  I  sit  down  on  the  deck  with 
my  haversack  beside  me.  I  wedge  myself 
securely,  my  feet  against  one  side  of  the 
passage,  my  back  against  the  other.  I  tuck 
my  waterproof  round  me  and  feel  that  I 
may  defy  fate  to  do  its  worst. 

A  few  others  drift  into  the  refuge,  or  are 
pressed  in  by  the  crowd  outside.  The 
Canadian  sister,  a  competent  young  woman, 
has  found  her  way  here  and  settled  down 
her  helpless  V.A.D.  on  a  valise — a  lumpy, 
uncomfortable  seat.  A  private  from  a 
Scottish  regiment  is  here,  two  Belgians  and 
a  Russian  staff  officer  struggle  in  a  narrow 
space  to  adjust  their  life-belts.  A  brigadier, 
a  keen-eyed,  eager-faced  young  man,  one 
Of  those  to  whom  the  war  has  given  oppor- 
tunity and  advancement,  joins  the  group. 
He  speaks  in  French  to  the  Belgians  and 
the  Russian.  He  helps  to  make  the  V.A.D. 
less  utterly  uncomfortable.  He  offers  me 
his  flask  and  then  a  cigar. 

There  is  one  subject  of  conversation. 
Will  the  boat  start  ?  The  Russian  is  hope- 
ful. Is  not  England  mistress  of  the  seas  ? 


256  LEAVE 

The  V.A.D.  is  despondent.  Once  before  in 
a  long-ago  time  of  leave  the  boat  did  not 
start.  The  passengers,  and  she  among  them, 
were  disembarked.  The  Scottish  private 
has  heard  from  a  friend  of  his  in  "  the 
Signals  "  that  German  submarines  are  abroad 
in  the  Channel.  The  brigadier  is  openly 
contemptuous  of  all  information  from  men 
in  "  the  Signals."  The  Canadian  sister  is 
cheerful.  If  she  were  captain  of  the  ship, 
she  says,  she  would  start,  and,  what  is  more, 
fetch  up  at  the  other  side. 

The  captain,  it  appears,  shares  her  spirit. 
The  ship  does  start.  The  harbour  is  cleared 
and  at  once  the  tossing  begins.  The  party 
between  the  deckhouses  sways  and  reels. 
It  becomes  clear  very  soon  that  it  will 
be  impossible  to  stand.  But  sitting  down 
is  difficult.  I  have  to  change  my  attitude. 
It  is  not  possible  for  any  one  else  to  sit 
down  if  I  keep  my  legs  stretched  out,  and 
the  others  must  sit  down  or  else  fall.  The 
brigadier  warns  the  Russian  to  be  careful 
how  he  bestows  himself. 

"  Don't  put  your  feet  on  my  haversack," 
he  says.  "  There's  a  bottle  of  hair-wash  in 
it." 

The  Russian  shifts  his  feet. 

"  There'll  be  a  worse  spill  if  you  trample 


LEAVE  25* 

on  mine,"  I  murmur.  "  There's  a  bottle  of 
Benedictine  in  it." 

"  Padre  !  "  said  the  brigadier.  "  I'm 
ashamed  of  you.  /  had  the  decency  to  call 
it  hair-wash." 

The  Canadian  sister  laughs  loud  and 
joyously. 

It  is  noticed  that  the  Scottish  private  is 
becoming  white.  Soon  his  face  is  worse 
than  white.  It  is  greyish  green.  The 
Canadian  sister  tucks  her  skirts  under  her. 
The  prospect  is  horrible.  There  is  no  room 
for  the  final  catastrophe  of  seasickness. 
The  brigadier  is  a  man  of  prompt  decision. 

"  Out  you  go,"  he  says  to  the  man.  "  Off 
with  you  and  put  your  head  over  the  side." 

I  feel  that  I  must  bestir  myself  for  the 
good  of  the  little  party,  though  I  do  not 
want  to  move.  I  seize  the  helpless  Scot 
by  the  arm  and  push  him  out.  The  next 
to  succumb  is  the  Russian  staff  officer.  His 
face  is  pallid  and  his  lips  blue.  The  V.A.D. 
is  past  caring  what  happens.  The  two 
Belgians  are  indifferent.  The  Canadian 
sister,  the  brigadier,  and  I  take  silent  counsel. 
Our  eyes  meet. 

"  I  can't  talk  French,"  I  say. 

"  I  can,"  said  the  Brigadier. 

He  does.  He  explains  politely  to  the 
17 


258  LEAVE 

Russian  the  indecency  of  being  seasick  in 
that  crowded  space.  He  points  out  that 
there  is  one  course  only  open  to  the  sufferer 
—to  go  away  and  bear  the  worst  elsewhere. 
Honour  calls  for  the  sacrifice.  The  Russian 
opens  his  eyes  feebly  and  looks  at  the  deck 
beyond  the  narrow  limits  of  his  refuge.  It 
is  swept  at  the  moment  by  a  shower  of  spray. 
He  shudders  and  closes  his  eyes  again.  The 
brigadier  persuades,  exhorts,  commands. 
The  Russian  shakes  his  head  and  intimates 
that  he  neither  speaks  nor  understands 
French.  He  is  a  brave  and  gallant  gentle- 
man. Shells  cannot  terrify  him,  nor  the 
fiercest  stuttering  of  the  field  guns  make 
him  hesitate  in  advance,  but  in  a  certain 
stage  of  seasickness  the  ears  of  very  heroes 
are  deaf  to  duty's  call. 

A  little  later  I  take  the  cigar  from  my 
mouth  and  crush  the  glowing  end  on  the 
deck.  I  am  not  seasick,  but  there  are  times 
when  tobacco  loses  its  attractiveness.  The 
brigadier  becomes  strangely  silent.  His  head 
shrinks  down  into  the  broad  upturned  collar 
of  his  coat.  Only  the  Canadian  sister  re- 
mains cheerfully  buoyant,  her  complexion 
as  fresh,  her  cheeks  as  pink  as  when  the 
rain  washed  them  on  the  quay. 

The  throbbing  of  the  engines  ceases.     For 


LEAVE  259 

a  brief  time  the  ship  wallows  in  the  rolling 
seas.  Then  she  begins  to  move  backwards 
towards  the  breakwater  of  the  harbour. 
The  brigadier  struggles  to  his  feet  and  peers 
out. 

"England  at  last,"  he  says.  "Thank 
goodness." 

Women,  officers,  and  men  fling  off  the  life- 
belts they  have  worn  and  crowd  to  the 
gangways.  With  shameless  eagerness  they 
push  their  way  ashore.  The  voyage  is  over. 

Along  the  pier  long  trains  are  drawn  up 
waiting  for  us.  We  crowd  into  them ;  lucky 
men,  or  foreseeing  men  with  seats  engaged 
beforehand,  fill  the  Pullman  cars  of  the  train 
which  starts  first.  It  runs  through  the 
sweet  familiar  English  country  incredibly 
swiftly  and  smoothly.  Luncheon  is  served 
to  us.  On  this  train,  at  least,  there  still  are 
restaurant  cars.  We  eat  familiar  food  and 
wonder  that  we  ever  in  the  old  days  grumbled 
at  railway  fare.  We  lie  back,  satisfied,  and 
smoke. 

But  there  is  in  us  an  excitement  which 
even  tobacco  will  not  soothe.  The  train 
goes  swiftly,  but  not  half  swiftly  enough. 
We  pass  town  and  hamlet.  Advertisement 
hoardings,  grotesque  flat  images  of  cows, 
outrageous  commendations  of  whisky  or 


260  LEAVE 

pills,  appear  in  the  fields.  We  are  getting 
near  London.  Pipes  are  laid  by.  We  fidget 
and  fret.  The  houses  we  pass  are  closer 
together,  get  closer  still,  merge  into  a  sea 
of  grey-slated  roofs.  The  air  is  thick,  smoke- 
laden.  The  train  slows  down,  stops,  starts 
again,  draws  up  finally  by  the  long  platform. 

Then !    To  every  man  his  own  dreams 

of  heaven  hereafter.  To  every  man  his  own 
way  of  spending  his  leave. 


CHAPTER   XVII 

A   HOLIDAY 

HOLIDAYS,  common  enough  in  civil  life,  are 
rare  joys  in  the  B.E.F.  Leave  is  obtainable 
occasionally.  But  nobody  speaks  of  leave 
as  "  holidays."  It  is  a  thing  altogether 
apart.  It  is  almost  sacred.  It  is  too  thrill- 
ing, too  rapturous  to  be  compared  to  any- 
thing we  knew  before  the  war.  We  should 
be  guilty  of  a  kind  of  profanity  if  we  spoke 
of  leave  as  "  holidays."  It  ought  to  have 
a  picturesque  and  impressive  name  of  its 
own ;  but  no  one  has  found  or  even  attempted 
to  find  an  adequate  name  for  it.  If  we  were 
pagans  instead  of  professing  to  be  Christians, 
if  we  danced  round  fountains  and  set  up 
statues  of  Pan  for  our  worship  and  knew 
nothing  of  the  Hebrew  spirit,  we  might 
get  a  name  for  "  leave  "  out  of  the  vocabu- 
lary of  our  religious  life.  Being  what  we  are 
we  cannot  do  that,  but  we  rightly  decline  to 
compare  leave  with  ordinary  holidays. 
Only  a  few  men  in  the  army  succeed  in 


262  A  HOLIDAY 

getting  what  is  properly  called  a  holiday, 
a  day  or  two  off  work  with  a  change  of 
scene.  I  got  one,  thanks  to  M.  It  is  one 
of  the  many  things,  perhaps  the  least  of 
them,  for  which  I  have  to  thank  his  friend- 
ship. 

M.  had  formed  an  exaggerated,  I  fear  a 
totally  erroneous,  idea  of  my  powers  of  enter- 
taining men.  It  occurred  to  him  that  it 
would  be  a  good  thing  if  I  gave  lectures  to 
the  men  of  the  cavalry  brigade  to  which  he 
was  attached.  What  he  said  to  the  general 
who  commanded  the  division  I  do  not  know, 
but  somehow,  between  the  general  and  M., 
the  thing  was  worked.  I  found  myself  with 
a  permit  to  travel  on  railways  otherwise 
barred  to  me  and  three  golden  days  before  me. 

No  one  can  say  that  life  in  my  tliree  camps 
was  dull.  Life  is  never  dull  or  monotonous 
for  a  man  who  has  plenty  of  pleasant  work 
to  do  and  a  party  of  good  friends  as  fellow- 
workers.  But  a  change  is  always  agreeable, 
and  I  looked  forward  to  my  trip  with  im- 
patient excitement. 

It  was  like  being  a  schoolboy  again  and 
going  forth  to  the  Crystal  Palace  with  money 
in  my  pocket,  an  entire  half-crown,  to  be 
dribbled  away  in  pennyworths  of  sherbet 
«,nd  visits  to  curious  side-shows.  That  party 


A  HOLIDAY  263 

was  an  annual  affair  for  us  that  came  in 
June  as  a  celebration  of  the  Queen's  birthday. 
My  visit  to  M.  was  in  August,  but  the  weather 
was  still  full  summer. 

As  a  lecturing  tour  that  expedition  was 
a  flat  failure.  M.'s  cavalry,  officers  and 
men,  were  frankly  bored  and  I  realised  from 
the  very  start  that  I  was  not  going  to  justify 
whatever  M.  said  to  the  general  about  me. 

In  every  other  respect  the  holiday  was 
a  success.  I  enjoyed  it  enormously  and  I 
gained  some  very  interesting  experience.  I 
saw  French  rural  life,  a  glimpse  of  it.  Cavalry 
cannot  be  concentrated  in  large  camps  as 
infantry  are.  When  they  are  not  wanted 
for  fighting  they  are  scattered  in  small 
parties  over  some  country  district  where 
they  can  get  water  and  proper  accommoda- 
tion for  their  horses.  The  men  are  billeted 
in  farm-houses.  The  officers  live  in  chateaux 
and  mess  in  the  dining-halls  of  French  country 
gentlemen  if  such  accommodation  is  avail- 
able, or  take  over  two  or  three  houses  in  a 
village,  sleep  where  they  can  and  mess  in 
the  best  room  which  the  interpreter  and 
the  billeting  officer  can  find. 

M.  slept  in  a  farm-house  and  secured  a 
room  adjoining  his  for  my  use.  I  slept  on 
the  softest  and  most  billowy  feather  bed  I 


264  A  HOLIDAY 

have  ever  come  across,  with  another  feather 
bed,  also  very  soft  and  billowy,  over  me  by 
way  of  covering.  My  room  had  an  earthen 
floor,  a  window  which  would  not  open,  a 
broken  chair  and  no  other  furniture  of  any 
kind.  I  do  not  think  that  our  landlady, 
the  wife  of  a  farmer  who  was  with  the  colours, 
had  removed  her  furniture  from  the  room 
to  keep  it  out  of  my  way.  That  almost 
bare  room  was  just  her  idea  of  what  a  bed- 
room ought  to  be.  Her  kitchen  and  such 
other  rooms  as  I  saw  in  her  house  were 
equally  bare. 

Unlike  the  French  women  whom  I  met 
in  towns,  this  farmer's  wife  was  a  slattern. 
She  cared  neither  about  her  own  appearance 
nor  the  look  of  her  house.  She  did  not  wash 
her  children.  But  she  worked.  The  land 
was  well  tilled  and  her  cattle  well  tended. 
There  was  no  sign  of  neglect  in  the  fields. 
Things  might  have  been  a  little  better, 
perhaps,  the  place  more  efficiently  worked, 
if  her  husband  had  been  at  home,  but  there 
was  not  room  for  much  improvement.  Yet 
that  woman  had  no  one  to  help  her  except 
a  very  old  man,  her  father-in-law,  I  think, 
who  was  infirm  and  almost  imbecile. 

She  had  four  children,  but  they  were 
hindrances  rather  than  helps.  The  eldest 


A  HOLIDAY  265 

of  them  was  about  eight  years  old.  She 
did  the  whole  work  of  the  farm  herself.  I 
used  to  hear  her  getting  up  at  4  a.m., 
lighting  a  fire  and  opening  doors.  Peeping 
through  the  half -transparent  pane  of  glass 
in  my  tiny  window,  I  saw  her  tending  her 
horse  and  cows  before  5  a.m.  She  worked 
on,  and  worked  hard,  all  day. 

The  French  have  not  had  to  face  the 
difficulty  of  the  "  one-man  business "  as 
we  have,  because  the  women  of  the  minor 
bourgeoisie  are  willing  and  able  to  step 
straight  into  their  husbands'  places  and 
carry  on.  I  learnt  that  when  I  lived  in 
towns.  The  French  can  go  farther  in  calling 
up  the  men  who  work  the  land,  because 
their  peasant  women  can  do  the  work  of 
men.  The  land  suffers,  I  suppose,  and  the 
harvests  are  poorer  than  in  peace  time.  But 
if  farms  in  England  were  left  manless  as 
those  French  farms  are,  the  result  would  be 
much  more  serious  in  spite  of  the  gallant 
efforts  of  the  girls  who  "  go  on  the  land." 

M.  and  I  tramped  about  that  country  a 
great  deal  while  I  was  with  him.  We  saw 
the  same  things  everywhere,  cattle  well 
cared  for  and  land  well  worked  by  a  few 
old  men  and  women  who  looked  old  long 
before  their  time, 


266  A  HOLIDAY 

Our  landlady  cannot  have  been  an  old 
woman.  Her  youngest  child  was  a  baby 
in  a  cradle,  but  she  looked  fifty  or  more. 
Loss  of  youth  and  beauty  is  a  heavy  price 
for  a  woman  to  pay  for  anything.  I  wonder 
if  she  resented  having  to  pay  it.  At  least 
she  has  the  satisfaction  of  knowing  that 
she  bought  something  worth  while  though 
she  paid  dearly.  She  kept  her  home.  She 
fed  her  children.  As  surely  as  her  husband 
in  the  trenches  she  helped  to  save  her  country. 

I  have  been  assured  that  the  French 
women  have  not  been  so  successful  as  Eng- 
lish women  in  the  conduct  of  war  charities. 
They  have  not  rushed  into  the  hospitals  to 
nurse  the  wounded  with  anything  like  the 
enthusiasm  and  devotion  of  our  V.A.D.'s. 
In  the  organisation  of  War  Work  Depots 
and  the  dispatching  of  parcels  to  prisoners 
of  war  the  French  women  have  proved 
themselves  on  the  whole  less  efficient  than 
English  women.  They  have  not  shone  in 
the  management  of  public  business,  where 
Englishwomen  have  been  unexpectedly  able 
and  devoted. 

On  the  other  hand  French  women  seem 
to  have  done  better  than  English  women 
in  the  conduct  of  their  private  affairs.  This, 
I  think,  is  true  both  of  the  bourgeois  and 


A  HOLIDAY  267 

peasant  classes.  In  England  the  earning 
power  on  which  the  house  depends  is  the 
man's.  When  he  is  taken  away  he  is  very 
badly  missed  and  the  home  suffers  or  even 
collapses.  In  France  the  women  are  more 
independent  economically.  They  can  carry 
on  the  business  or  the  farm  sufficiently  well 
without  the  man. 

But  I  did  not  get  permission  to  visit  M.'s 
cavalry  division  that  I  might  observe  the 
French  peasantry.  I  went  to  give  lectures 
to  the  men.  I  did  that,  faithfully  exerting 
myself  to  the  uttermost,  but  I  did  it  very 
badly.  I  suppose  I  am  not  adaptable. 
Certainly  the  conditions  under  which  I 
lectured  destroyed  any  faint  chance  of  my 
succeeding,  before  I  began. 

It  has  been  my  lot  to  lecture  under  various 
circumstances  to  widely  different  kinds  of 
audiences.  I  have  been  set  up  at  the  end 
of  a  drawing-room  in  a  house  of  culture 
in  the  middle  west  of  the  U.S.A.  I  have 
stood  beside  a  chairman  on  a  platform  in 
an  English  hall.  Never  before  had  I  been 
called  upon  to  lecture  in  a  large  open  field, 
standing  in  the  sunlight,  while  my  audience 
reclined  peacefully  on  the  grass  under  a 
grove  of  trees.  Never  before  had  I  watched 
my  audience  marched  up  to  me  by  squadrons, 


268  A  HOLIDAY 

halted  in  front  of  me  by  the  stern  voices  of 
sergeants,  and  sitting  down,  or  lying  down, 
only  after  I  had  invited  them  to  do  so.  It 
was  a  very  hot  afternoon.  I  do  not  wonder 
that  half  the  men  went  to  sleep.  I  should 
have  liked  to  sleep  too. 

I  lectured  that  same  day  in  another  field 
to  a  different  body  of  men.  There  I  was 
even  more  uncomfortable.  Two  thoughtful 
sergeants  borrowed  a  table  from  a  neigh- 
bouring house  and  I  stood  on  it.  That 
audience  stayed  awake,  perhaps  in  hope  of 
seeing  me  fall  off  the  table,  but  made  no 
pretence  of  enjoying  the  lecture. 

Yet  it  was  not  altogether  the  strange 
conditions  of  the  performance  which  worried 
me.  I  should,  I  think,  have  come  to  grief 
just  as  badly  with  those  audiences  if  they 
had  been  collected  into  rooms  or  halls.  I 
was  out  of  touch  with  the  men  I  was  talking 
to.  I  did  not  understand  them  or  how  to 
address  them.  I  had  some  experience,  ex- 
perience of  six  months  or  so,  of  soldiers ; 
but  that  was  no  help  to  me.  These  were 
soldiers  of  a  kind  quite  new  to  me.  They 
belonged  to  the  old  army.  Officers  and 
men  alike  were  professionals,  not  amateurs 
soldiering  by  chance  like  the  rest  of  us. 

The  cavalry  is,  with  the  possible  exception 


A  HOLIDAY  2C9 

of  the  Guards,  the  only  part  of  our  force  in 
which  the  spirit  of  the  old  army  survives. 
Every  infantry  battalion  has  been  destroyed 
and  renewed  so  often  since  the  war  began 
that  the  original  personality  of  the  thing, 
the  sense  of  memory,  the  link  with  the  past 
and  all  its  traditions,  no  longer  survives. 
An  infantry  regiment  bears  an  old  name  ; 
but  it  is  a  new  thing.  Its  resemblance  to 
the  regiment  which  bore  the  name  before  the 
war  is  superficial,  a  thin  veneer.  In  spirit, 
outlook,  tone,  interest,  tradition,  in  all  but 
courage  and  patriotism,  it  is  different.  In  the 
cavalry  this  great  change  has  not  taken  place. 

The  cavalry  suffered  heavily  in  the  early 
days  of  the  war  and  has  lost  many  men  since. 
Large  numbers  of  recruits  have  come  in 
to  make  good  the  losses.  But  the  number 
of  new  men  has  never  been  so  great  as  to 
destroy  the  old  regiment's  power  of  ab- 
sorption. Recruits  have  been  digested  by 
the  original  body.  They  have  grown  up 
in  the  tradition  of  the  regiment  and  have 
been  formed  by  its  spirit.  The  difference 
between  the  cavalry  troopers  and  the  in- 
fantry privates  of  the  army  of  to-day  is 
difficult  to  define ;  but  it  is  very  easily 
felt  and  plain  to  recognise. 

Perhaps   it  is   most   clearly   seen  in   the 


270  A  HOLIDAY 

attitude  of  men  towards  their  officers.  In 
the  old  army  officers  were  a  class  apart. 
Everything  that  could  be  done  was  done  to 
emphasise  the  distinction  between  officers 
and  men.  And  the  distinction  was  a  real, 
not  an  artificial  thing.  The  officer  was 
different  from  the  men  he  commanded.  He 
belonged  to  a  different  class.  He  had  been 
educated  in  a  different  way.  He  was  accus- 
tomed before  he  joined  the  army  and  after 
he  left  it  to  live  a  life  utterly  unlike  the 
life  of  the  men  he  commanded.  It  can 
scarcely  have  been  necessary  to  deepen  by 
disciplinary  means  the  strong,  clear  line 
between  officers  and  men. 

In  the  new  army  all  that  can  be  done  by 
regulations  is  done  to  keep  up  the  idea  of  the 
officer  super  class.  But  the  distinction  now 
is  an  artificial  one,  not  a  real  one.  Neither  in 
education,  social  class,  manner  of  life,  wealth, 
nor  any  other  accident  are  our  new  officers 
distinct  from  the  men  they  command. 

For  the  men  of  the  old  army  the  officer 
was  a  leader  because  he  was  recognisably  in 
some  sense  a  superior.  He  might  be  a 
good  officer  or  a  poor  one,  brave  and  efficient 
or  the  reverse.  Whatever  his  personal 
qualities  he  was  an  officer,  a  natural  leader. 

For  the  men  of  the  new  army  an  officer 


A  HOLIDAY  271 

is  an  officer  more  or  less  by  accident.  No 
one  recognises  any  kind  of  divine  right  to 
leadership.  Discipline  may  insist,  does  quite 
rightly  insist,  on  due  respect  to  officers  as 
such ;  but  everybody  feels  and  knows  that 
this  is  a  mere  question  of  expediency.  Men 
cannot  act  together  unless  some  one  com- 
mands ;  but  it  does  not  follow  that  the  man 
who  gives  the  orders  is  in  any  permanent 
way  the  superior  of  the  men  who  receive 
them. 

What  has  really  happened  during  the  war 
is  that  the  army  has  changed  in  the  essential 
spirit  of  its  organisation.  It  is  no  longer 
built  on  the  aristocratic  principle  like  the 
army  of  Louis  XIV.  It  has  been  demo- 
cratised and  is  approximating  to  the  type 
of  Napoleon's  armies  or  Cromwell's  Ironsides. 
The  shell  of  the  old  organisation  is  there 
still.  The  life  within  the  shell  is  different. 

I  do  not  know  how  the  men  of  the  old 
army  regarded  their  generals  and  officers  in 
high  command.  If  we  may  trust  Kipling 
they  had,  sometimes  at  least,  a  feeling  of 
strong  personal  affection  and  admiration 
for  certain  commanders. 

"  He's  little,  but  he's  wise, 
And  he  does  not  advertise, 
Do  you,  Bobs  ?  " 


272  A  HOLIDAY 

Very  likely  the  cavalry  men  still  have  this 
kind  of  feeling  for  their  generals.  The  men 
of  the  brigade  I  visited  certainly  ought  to 
have  loved  their  general.  He  did  a  great 
deal  for  them.  But  the  new  army  does 
not  seem  to  have  any  feeling  either  of  respect 
or  contempt  for  its  generals. 

Nothing  surprised  me  more  when  I  became 
intimate  with  the  men  than  their  attitude 
towards  their  commanding  officers.  I  had 
read  of  the  devotion  of  armies  to  their 
leaders.  We  are  told  how  Napoleon's  soldiers 
idolised  him ;  how  Wellington's  men  be- 
lieved in  him  so  that  they  were  prepared  to 
follow  him  anywhere,  confident  in  his  genius. 
Misled  by  newspaper  correspondents,  I  sup- 
posed that  I  should  find  this  sort  of  thing 
common  in  France.  I  had  often  read  of 
this  general  and  that  as  beloved  or  trusted 
by  his  men. 

In  fact  no  such  spirit  exists.  Very  often 
the  men  do  not  know  the  name  of  the  com- 
mander of  the  particular  army,  or  even  the 
brigade,  to  which  they  belong ;  so  little  has 
the  personality  of  the  general  impressed 
itself  on  the  men.  Very  often  I  used  to 
meet  evidences  of  personal  loyalty  to  a 
junior  officer,  a  company  commander,  or  a 
subaltern.  Occasionally  men  have  the  same 


A  HOLIDAY  278 

feeling  about  a  colonel.  They  never  seem 
to  go  beyond  that.  There  was  not  a  trace 
of  admiration  for  or  confidence  in  any  one 
in  high  command.  It  was  not  that  the 
men  distrusted  their  generals  or  disliked 
them.  Their  attitude  was  generally  neutral. 
They  knew  nothing  and  cared  very  little 
about  generals. 

Perhaps  men  never  did  idolise  generals, 
and  historians,  like  newspaper  correspon- 
dents, are  simply  inventing  pretty  myths 
when  they  tell  us  about  the  hero  worship 
paid  to  Napoleon,  Wellington,  and  the 
rest. 

Perhaps  the  fact  is  that  the  conditions  of 
modern  warfare  tend  to  obscure  the  glory 
of  a  general.  He  can  no  longer  prance 
about  on  a  horse  in  front  of  lines  of  gaping 
men,  proudly  contemptuous  of  the  cannon 
balls  which  come  bounding  across  the  field 
of  battle  from  the  enemy's  artillery.  His 
men  are  inclined  to  forget  his  existence, 
usually  do  remain  ignorant  of  his  name 
because  they  do  not  see  him.  One  is 
tempted  to  wonder  whether  the  formal— 
and  very  wearisome — inspections  which  are 
held  from  time  to  time  behind  the  lines, 
generally  on  cold  and  rainy  days,  are  not 
really  pathetic  efforts  of  kings  and  generals 
18 


274  A  HOLIDAY 

to  assert  themselves,  to  get  somehow  into 
the  line  of  vision  of  the  fighting  men. 

Perhaps  it  may  be  that  generals,  through 
no  fault  of  their  own,  have  lost  that  "  plaguy 
trick  of  winning  victories  "  which  bound  the 
heart  of  Dugald  Dalgetty  to  Gustavus  Adol- 
phus.  Victories,  so  far  as  we  can  see,  are 
things  which  do  not  occur  in  modern  war- 
fare, or,  at  all  events,  do  not  occur  on  the 
western  front.  If  any  one  did  win  a  victory 
of  the  old-fashioned  kind  it  is  quite  possible 
that  he  might  become  the  hero  of  the  soldier. 

It  would  be  very  interesting  to  know  what 
the  feelings  of  soldiers  of  other  armies  are 
towards  their  generals.  The  German  people 
seem  to  idolise  von  Hindenburg.  Have  the 
German  soldiers  any  kind  of  confidence  in 
his  star  ?  Von  Mackensen  has  some  brilliant 
exploits  to  his  credit.  Does  Fritz,  drafted 
into  a  regiment  commanded  by  him,  march 
forward  serenely  confident  of  victory  ? 

Our  men  do  no  such  thing.  They  have 
unshaken  confidence  in  themselves.  They 
are  sure  that  their  company  commanders 
will  not  fail  them  or  their  colonels  let  them 
down.  But  they  have  no  kind  of  feeling, 
good  or  bad,  about  their  generals. 


CHAPTER   XVIII 

PADRES 

THE  name  "padre"  as  used  in  the  army  de- 
scribes every  kind  of  commissioned  chaplain, 
Church  of  England,  Roman  Catholic,  Pres- 
byterian, or  Nonconformist.  The  men  lump 
them  all  together.  I  have  heard  a  distinction 
made  between  "  pukka  "  padres  and  those 
who  have  not  enjoyed  the  advantages  of 
episcopal  ordination.  Rut  such  denomina- 
tional feeling  is  extremely  rare.  As  a  rule 
a  padre  is  a  padre,  an  officially  recognised 
representative  of  religion,  whatever  church 
he  belongs  to.  The  same  kind  of  character, 
the  same  general  line  of  conduct,  are  expected 
in  all  padres.  We  shall  get  a  side  light,  if 
no  more,  on  the  much-discussed  question  of 
the  religion  of  the  army  if  we  can  arrive  at 
an  understanding  of  the  way  in  which  the 
padre  strikes  the  average  man. 

The    statistical    method    of    arriving    at 
knowledge  is  chiefly  useful  for  purposes  of 

275 


276  PADRES 

controversy.  Any  one  with  access  to  official 
records  might  set  out  for  admiration  the 
hierarchy  of  padres,  ranging  from  the  Chap- 
lain-General to  the  humble  C.F.  Fourth 
Glass,  might  enumerate  the  confirmations 
held,  the  candidates  presented,  the  buildings 
erected,  perhaps  the  sermons  preached.  It 
would  then  be  possible  to  prove  that  the 
Church  is  doing  her  duty  by  the  soldiers  or 
that  the  Church  is  failing  badly,  whichever 
seemed  desirable  to  prove  at  the  moment. 

That  is  the  great  advantage  of  the  statisti- 
cal method.  It  establishes  beyond  all  possi- 
bility of  contradiction  the  thing  you  want 
to  establish.  But  if  you  do  not  want  to 
establish  anything,  if  you  merely  want  to 
find  out  something,  statistics  are  no  use  at 
all.  You  are  driven  to  other  ways  of  getting 
at  the  truth,  ways  much  less  definite  and 
accurate. 

I  wish  there  were  more  pictures  of  army 
chaplains.  There  are  a  few.  I  do  not 
recollect  that  Bairnsfather  ever  gave  us 
one,  but  they  turn  up  from  time  to  time  in 
the  pages  of  Punch.  There  was  one  in  which 
a  senior  curate  in  uniform — the  story  is 
told  in  France  of  a  much  more  august  person 
— is  represented  waving  a  farewell  to  a  party 
of  French  soldiers,  expressing  the  hope  que 


PADRES  277 

le  bon  Dieu  vous  blesserait  toujours.  We 
need  not  concern  ourselves  with  his  French. 
Staff  officers  and  even  generals  have  made 
less  excusable  blunders. 

What  is  interesting  is  the  figure  and  face 
of  the  young  man.  He  is  alert  and  plainly 
very  energetic.  He  is  full  of  the  spirit  of 
comradeship.  One  glance  at  him  convinces 
you  that  he  means  to  be  helpful  in  every 
possible  way  to  every  human  being  he  comes 
across.  He  is  not  going  to  shirk.  He  is 
certainly  not  going  to  funk.  You  feel  sure 
as  you  look  at  him  that  he  will  keep  things 
going  at  a  sing-song,  that  a  canteen  under 
his  management  will  be  efficiently  run.  He 
is  a  very  different  man  indeed  from  that 
pre-war  curate  of  Punch's  whose  egg  has 
become  proverbial,  or  that  other  who  con- 
fided to  an  admiring  lady  that,  when  preach- 
ing, he  liked  every  fold  of  his  surplice  to 
tell.  He  is  not  intellectual,  but  he  is 
not,  in  practical  matters,  by  any  means  a 
fool. 

His  sermons  will  be  commonplace,  but— 
you  congratulate  yourself  on  this — they 
will  certainly  be  short,  and  he  will  neither 
be  surprised  nor  hurt  if  nobody  listens  to 
them.  There  will  be  nothing  mawkish  about 
his  religion  and  he  will  not  obtrude  it  over 


278  PADRES 

much,  but  when  he  starts  the  men  singing 
"  Fight  the  good  fight,"  that  hymn  will  go 
with  a  swing.  In  the  officers'  mess,  when 
the  shyness  of  the  first  few  days  has  worn 
off,  he  will  be  recognised  as  "  a  good  sort." 
The  men's  judgment,  expressed  in  the  can- 
teen after  a  football  match,  will  differ  from 
the  officers'  by  one  letter  only.  The  padre 
will  be  classed  as  "  a  good  sport." 

There  are  other  sketches  of  padres,  and 
they  do  not  always  represent  men  of  the 
senior-curate  age.  There  is  one,  for  instance, 
which  serves  as  an  advertisement  of  a 
tobacco,  in  which  the  chaplain  is  a  man  of 
forty  or  forty-five.  Before  the  war  he  must 
have  been  vicar  of  a  fair-sized  parish,  very 
well  organised.  And  it  is  not  always  the 
11  good  sort "  qualities  which  the  artist 
emphasises.  There  is  a  suggestion  occa- 
sionally of  a  certain  stiffness,  a  moral 
rigidity  as  of  a  man  not  inclined  to  look 
with  tolerant  eyes  on  the  "  cakes  and  ale  " 
of  life. 

Sometimes  we  get  a  hint  of  a  conscious- 
ness of  official  position.  It  is  not  that  the 
padre  of  these  pictures  is  inclined  to  say 
"  I'm  an  officer  and  don't  you  forget  it." 
He  is  not  apparently  suspected  of  that. 
But  he  is  a  man  who  might  conceivably  say 


PADRES  279 

"  I'm  a  priest  and  it  won't  do  for  me  to 
let  any  one  forget  that." 

Yet,  even  in  these  pictures,  we  are  left 
with  the  feeling  that  the  men  who  sat  for 
them  were  competent  and  in  their  way 
effective.  There  is  no  suggestion  of  feeble- 
ness, the  characteristic  of  the  pre-war  cleric 
which  most  commonly  struck  the  artist. 
And  we  recognise  that  the  clergy  have  dis- 
carded pose  and  affectation  along  with  the 
dog  collars  which  most  of  them  have  left 
behind  in  England.  Freed  from  the  society 
of  elderly  women,  the  British  cleric  has 
without  difficulty  made  himself  very  much 
at  home  in  the  company  of  men. 

That  is  the  impression  we  get  of  the  padre 
from  the  artists  who  have  drawn  pictures 
of  him.  But  there  are  not  nearly  enough 
of  these  pictures  to  make  us  sure  that  it  is 
in  just  this  way  that  the  men  in  France 
regard  the  clergy  who  have  gone  on  active 
service.  The  fact  is  that  the  artists  who 
have  sketched  generals  and  staff  officers  in 
hundreds,  subalterns  in  thousands,  and  men 
of  the  ranks  in  uncountable  numbers,  have 
not  taken  very  much  notice  of  the  padres. 
They  felt  perhaps  that  the  clergy  did  not 
really  count  for  much  in  army  life. 

Fortunately  it  is  not  only  in  the  drawing 


280  PADRES 

of  artists  that  the  general  opinion  finds 
expression.  The  average  man,  a  very  sure 
and  sane  judge  of  worth,  cannot  use  pencil, 
brush,  or  paint ;  but  he  has  other  ways  of 
expressing  himself.  For  instance  he  labels 
whole  classes  with  nicknames. 

Consider  the  various  names  for  the  enemy 
which  are  current  in  the  trenches.  "  Hun  " 
was  not  the  invention  of  the  army.  It 
came  from  the  newspapers.  The  soldier 
uses  it,  but  not  with  delight.  He  prefers 
"  Boche  "  ;  but  that  was  not  his  own  word 
either.  It  originated  with  the  French.  And 
there  is  a  noticeable  difference  between  the 
way  a  Frenchman  and  an  Englishman  say 
"Boche."  The  Frenchman  hisses  it.  In 
his  mouth  it  is  eloquent  of  a  bitter  hatred 
for  something  vile.  An  Englishman  says 
"Boche  "  quite  differently.  You  feel  as  you 
listen  to  him  that  he  regards  his  enemy  as 
brutal  and  abominable,  but  also  as  swollen, 
flatulent,  and  somewhat  ridiculous. 

"  Fritz  "  and  not  "  Boche  "  is  our  own 
invention  in  the  way  of  a  name  for  the 
enemy.  It  expresses  just  what  the  men 
feel.  "  Fritz  "  whom  we  "  strafe  "  con- 
tinually is  in  the  main  a  ridiculous  person, 
and  any  healthy-minded  man  wants  to  rag 
him.  There  is  an  inflated  pomposity  about 


PADRES  281 

Fritz ;  but  given  the  necessary  hammering 
he  may  turn  out  to  be  a  human  being  like 
ourselves.  He  wants  to  get  home  just  as 
we  do.  He  likes  beer,  which  is  very  hard 
to  come  by  for  any  of  us,  and  he  enjoys 
tobacco. 

Or  take  another  nickname.  Generals  and 
staff  officers  are  called  "  Brass  Hats."  The 
name  was  fastened  on  them  early  in  the  war 
and  it  still  sticks.  Perhaps  if  we  were 
starting  fresh  now  we  should  give  them 
another  name,  a  kindlier  one.  For  a  "  Brass 
Hat,"  if  such  a  thing  existed,  would  be  more 
ornamental  than  useful.  It  would  occupy 
a  man's  time  in  polishing  it,  would  shine, 
no  doubt  agreeably,  on  ceremonial  occasions, 
but  would  be  singularly  uncomfortable  for 
daily  wear.  Is  that  the  sort  of  way  the 
fighting  men  thought  of  the  staff  after  Neuve 
Chapelle  ?  The  name  suggests  some  such 
general  opinion  and  the  name  passed  into 
general  use. 

"  Padre "  is  another  nickname ;  but  a 
friendly  one.  I  should  much  rather  be 
called  a  padre  than  a  Brass  Hat.  I  should 
much  rather  be  called  a  padre  than  a  parson. 
It  is  an  achievement,  something  they  may 
well  be  proud  of,  that  the  old  regular  chap- 
lains were  spoken  of  by  officers  and  men 


282  PADRES 

alike  as  padres.  I,  who  had  no  part  in 
winning  the  name,  feel  -a  real  satisfaction 
when  I  open  a  letter  from  man  or  officer 
and  find  that  it  begins  "  Dear  Padre." 

And  yet — there  is  a  certain  playfulness 
in  the  name.  A  padre  is  not  one  of  the 
serious  things  in  army  life.  No  such  nick- 
name attaches  or  could  attach  to  a  C.O.  or 
a  sergeant-major.  They  matter.  A  padre 
does  not  matter  much.  Religion,  his  proper 
business,  is  an  extra,  like  music  lessons  at 
a  public  school.  Music  is  a  great  art,  of 
course.  No  one  denies  it,  chiefly  because 
no  normal  boy  thinks  about  it  at  all.  The 
real  affairs  of  life  are  the  Latin  grammar 
and  the  cricket  bat.  There  is  a  master  who 
gives  music  lessons  to  those  who  want  such 
things.  He  may  be  an  amiable  and  estim- 
able man ;  but  compared  to  a  form  master 
or  the  ex-blue  who  is  capable  of  making 
his  century  against  first-class  bowling,  he  is 
nobody. 

Some  feeling  of  that  kind  finds  expression  in 
the  nickname  "padre."  It  is  not  contempt. 
There  is  not  room  for  real  contempt  along- 
side of  the  affection  which  the  name  implies. 
It's  just  a  sense  that,  neither  for  good  nor 
evil,  is  the  padre  of  much  importance. 
It  is  impossible  to  imagine  King  Henry 


PADRES  283 

speaking  of  Thomas  a  Becket  as  the  padre. 
He  hated  that  archbishop,  and  he  also  feared 
him,  so  he  called  him,  not  a  padre,  but  a 
turbulent  priest. 

Is  the  kingdom  of  heaven  best  advanced 
by  men  who  strike  the  world  as  being 
'*  padres  "  or  by  "  turbulent  priests  "  ?  It 
is  a  very  nice  question. 

There  is  yet  another  way  in  which  we  get 
at  that  most  elusive  thing,  popular  opinion. 
Stories  are  told  and  jokes  passed  from  mouth 
to  mouth.  It  is  not  the  least  necessary 
that  the  stories  should  be  true,  literally. 
They  are  indeed  much  more  likely  to  give 
us  what  we  want,  a  glimpse  into  the  mind 
of  the  average  man,  if  they  are  cheerily 
unconnected  with  sordid  facts.  No  one 
supposes  that  any  colonial  colonel  ever 
begged  his  men  not  to  address  him  as  "  Sam  " 
in  the  presence  of  an  English  general.  But 
the  story  gives  us  a  true  idea  of  the  impres- 
sion made  on  the  minds  of  the  home  army 
by  the  democratic  spirit  of  the  men  from 
overseas. 

I  only  know  one  padre  story  which  has 
become  universally  popular.  It  takes  the 
form  of  a  dialogue. 

Sentry  :    "  Who  goes  there  ?  " 

Padre :    "  Chaplain." 


284  PADRES 

Sentry  :  "  Pass,  Charlie  Chaplin,  and  all's 
well." 

It  is  not  a  very  instructive  story,  though 
the  pun  is  only  fully  appreciated  when  we 
realise  that  it  depends  for  its  value  on  the 
contrast  between  a  man  whose  business  is 
the  comedy  of  grimace  and  one  who  is 
concerned  with  very  serious  things.  That 
in  itself  is  a  popular  judgment.  Religion 
is  a  solemn  business,  and  the  church  stands 
against  the  picture  house  in  sharp  contrast ; 
the  resemblance  between  chaplain  and 
Chaplin  being  no  more  than  an  accident  of 
sound. 

There  are  other  stories — not  "  best  sellers," 
but  with  a  respectable  circulation — which 
throw  more  light  on  the  way  the  padre  is 
regarded.  For  instance,  a  certain  fledgling 
curate  was  sent  to  visit  a  detention  camp. 
He  returned  to  his  senior  officer  and  gave 
a  glowing  account  of  his  reception.  The 
prisoners,  no  hardened  scoundrels  as  he 
supposed,  had  gathered  round  him,  had 
listened  eagerly  while  he  read  and  expounded 
a  chapter  of  St.  John's  Gospel,  had  shown 
every  sign  of  pious  penitence.  Thrusting 
his  hand  in  his  pocket  while  relating  his 
experience,  this  poor  man  found  that  his 
cigarette  case,  his  pipe,  his  tobacco  pouch, 


PADRES  285 

his  knife,  his  pencil,  and  some  loose  change 
had  been  taken  from  him  while  he  discoursed 
on  the  Gospel  of  St.  John. 

I  like  to  think  that  men  will  tell  a  story 
like  that  about  their  clergy.  The  padre, 
an  ideal  figure,  who  is  the  hero  of  it,  will 
fail  to  win  respect  perhaps.  He  will,  if  he 
preserve  his  innocence,  win  love.  There 
will  come  a  day  when  even  those  prisoners 

will .     See  Book  I  of  Les  Miser dbles  and 

the  Gospel  generally. 

A  chaplain,  this  time  no  mere  boy,  but  a 
senior  man  of  great  experience,  was  called  on 
to  hold  a  service  for  a  battalion  which  was 
to  go  next  day  into  the  firing-line.  This 
particular  battalion  was  fresh  from  England 
and  had  never  been  under  fire.  It  wanted  a 
religious  service.  The  chaplain  preached  to 
it  on  tithes  considered  as  a  divine  institution. 

I  am  sure  that  story  is  not  true.  It  cannot 
be.  No  human  being  is  capable  of  so  gro- 
tesque an  action.  But  consider  the  fact 
that  such  a  story  has  been  invented  and  is 
told.  It  seems  that  men — in  this  case 
hungry  sheep  who  look  up — actually  find 
that  the  sermons  preached  to  them  have 
no  conceivable  connection  with  reality. 
About  to  die,  they  ask  for  words  of  life— 
they  are  given  disquisitions  on  tithes. 


286  PADRES 

"  Well,  sir  " —  I  have  had  this  said  to  me 
a  hundred  times—"  I  am  not  a  religious 
man."  If  religion  is  really  presented  to  the 
ordinary  man  as  "  tithes,"  or  for  that  matter 
as  a  "  scheme  of  salvation,"  or  "  sound 
church  teaching,"  it  is  no  wonder  that  he 
stands  a  bit  away  from  it.  I  in  no  way 
mean  to  suggest  that  all  religion  in  the  army 
is  of  this  kind.  But  the  broadly  indis- 
putable result  of  the  preaching  to  which 
our  men  have  been  subjected  is  this  :  They 
have  come  to  regard  religion  as  an  obscure 
and  difficult  subject  in  which  a  few  people 
with  eccentric  tastes  are  interested,  but 
which  simple  men  had  better  leave  alone. 
And  the  tragedy  lies  in  the  fact  that  the 
very  men  who  think  and  speak  thus  about 
religion  have  in  them  something  very  like 
the  spirit  of  Christ. 

The  padres  themselves,  the  best  and  most 
earnest  of  them,  are  painfully  aware  that  the 
ordinary  pulpit  sermon  is  remote,  utterly 
and  hopelessly,  from  the  lives  of  the  men, 
is  in  fact  a  so  many  times  repeated  essay 
on  tithes.  And  the  padres,  again  the  best 
of  them,  are  not  content  to  be  just  padres. 
They  feel  that  they  ought  to  have  a  message 
to  deliver,  that  they  have  one  if  only  they 
can  disentangle  it  from  the  unrealities  which 


PADRES  287 

have  somehow  got  coiled  up  with  it.  All 
the  odd  little  eccentricities  in  the  form  of 
service  and  the  recent  fashion  of  spicing 
sermons  with  unexpected  swear -words  are 
just  pathetic  efforts  to  wriggle  out  of  the 
clothes  of  ecclesiastical  propriety. 

But  something  more  is  wanted.  It  is  of 
little  avail  to  hand  round  cigarettes  before 
reading  the  first  lesson,  or  to  say  that  God 
isn't  a  bloody  fool,  unless  some  connection 
can  be  established  between  the  religion 
which  the  men  have  and  the  religion  which 
Christ  taught. 

There  is  another  story  which  should  be 
told  for  the  sake  of  the  light  it  gives  on 
the  way  men  regard  the  padres,  or  used  to 
regard  them.  They  are  less  inclined  to 
this  view  now. 

A  chaplain,  wandering  about  behind  the 
lines,  found  a  group  of  men  and  sat  down 
among  them.  He  chatted  for  a  while. 
Then  one  of  the  men  said  "Beg  pardon,  sir, 
but  do  you  know  who  we  are  ?  "  The  chap- 
lain did  not.  "I  thought  not,  sir,"  said 
the  man.  "  If  you  did  you  wouldn't  stay. 
We're  prisoners,  sir,  waiting  to  be  sent  off 
for  Field  Punishment  No.  1." 

The  story  often  finishes  at  that  point, 
leaving  it  to  be  supposed  that  the  padre  was 


288  PADRES 

unpleasantly  surprised  at  finding  himself  on 
friendly  terms  with  sinners,  but  there  is  a 
version  sometimes  told  which  gives  the 
padre's  answer.  "  It's  where  I  ought  to  be." 

I  am  not,  I  hope,  over-sanguine,  but  I 
think  that  men  are  beginning  to  realise  that 
the  padre  is  not  a  supernumerary  member 
of  the  officers'  mess,  nor  concerned  only  with 
the  small  number  of  men  who  make  a  pro- 
fession of  religion ;  that  he  is  neither  a 
member  of  the  upper,  officer,  class,  nor  a 
mild  admirer  of  the  goody-goody,  but — shall 
we  say  ? — a  friend  of  publicans  and  sinners. 

It  is  a  confusing  question,  this  one  of  the 
religion  of  the  soldier,  who  is  nowadays  the 
ordinary  man,  and  his  relation  to  the  Church 
or  the  churches.  But  we  do  get  a  glimpse 
of  his  mind  when  we  understand  how  he 
thinks  of  the  clergy.  He  knows  them  better 
out  in  France  than  he  ever  did  at  home, 
and  they  know  him  better.  He  has  recog- 
nised the  " parson  "  as  a  padre  and  a 

good  sport.  That  is  something.  Will  the 
padre,  before  this  abominable  war  is  over 
and  his  opportunity  past,  be  able  to  establish 
his  position  as  something  more,  as  perhaps 
the  minister  and  steward  of  God's  mysteries  ? 


CHAPTER    XIX 

CITIZEN    SOLDIERS 

I  STOOD,  with  my  friend  M.  beside  me,  on 
the  top  of  a  hill  and  looked  down  at  a  large 
camp  spread  out  along  the  valley  beneath  us. 
It  was  growing  dark.  The  lines  of  lights 
along  the  roads  shone  bright  and  clear. 
Lights  twinkled  from  the  windows  of  busv 

w 

orderly-rooms  and  offices.  Lights  shone, 
browny  red,  through  the  canvas  of  the  tents. 
The  noise  of  thousands  of  men,  talking, 
laughing,  singing,  rose  to  us,  a  confused 
murmur  of  sound.  As  we  stood  there, 
looking,  listening,  a  bugle  sounded  from  one 
corner  of  the  great  camp,  blowing  the  "  Last 
Post."  One  after  another,  from  all  direc- 
tions, many  bugles  took  up  the  sound. 
Lights  were  extinguished.  Silence  followed 
by  degrees.  We  scrambled  down  a  steep 
path  to  our  quarters. 

"  This,"  I  said,  "  is  not  an  army.  It  is 
an  empire  in  arms." 

M.  would  never  have  made  a  remark  of 

19  289 


290  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

that  kind.  He  has  too  much  common  sense 
to  allow  himself  to  talk  big.  He  is,  of  all 
men  known  to  me,  least  inclined  to  senti- 
mentality. He  did  not  even  answer  me. 
If  he  had  he  would  probably  have  pointed 
out  to  me  that  I  was  wrong.  What  lay 
below  us,  a  small  part  of  the  B.E.F.,  was  an 
army,  if  discipline,  skill,  valour,  and  unity 
are  what  distinguish  an  army  from  a  mob. 

Yet  what  I  said  meant  something.  I  had 
seen  enough  of  the  professional  soldiers  of 
the  old  army,  officers  and  N.C.O.'s,  to  know 
that  the  men  who  are  now  fighting  are 
soldiers  with  a  difference.  They  do  not 
conform  to  the  type  which  we  knew  as  the 
soldier  type  before  the  war.  Neither  officers 
nor  men  are  the  same.  Only  in  the  cavalry, 
and  perhaps  in  the  Guards,  do  we  now  find 
the  spirit,  or,  if  spirit  is  the  wrong  word,  the 
flavour  of  the  old  army.  The  professional 
soldier,  save  among  field  officers  and  the 
older  N.C.O.'s,  is  becoming  rare.  The  citizen 
soldier  has  taken  his  place. 

To  say  this  is  to  repeat  a  commonplace. 
My  remark  was  a  commonplace,  stale  with 
reiteration.  But  it  is  the  nature  of  common- 
places and  truisms  that  they  only  become 
real  to  us  when  we  discover  them  for  our- 
selves. I  was  familiar  with  the  idea  of  the 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  291 

citizen  soldier,  with  the  very  phrase  "  an 
empire  in  arms,"  long  before  I  went  to 
France.  Yet  my  earliest  experiences  were 
a  surprise  to  me.  I  had  believed,  but  I  had 
not  realised,  that  our  ranks  indeed  contain 
"  all  sorts  and  conditions  of  men." 

I  remember  very  well  the  first  time  that 
the  truism  began  to  assert  itself  as  a  truth 
to  me.  I  was  in  a  soldiers'  club,  one  of 
those  excellent  places  of  refreshment  and 
recreation  run  by  societies  and  individuals 
for  the  benefit  of  our  men.  It  was  an 
abominable  evening.  Snow,  that  was  half 
sleet,  was  driven  across  the  camp  by  a  strong 
wind.  Melting  snow  lay  an  inch  deep  on 
the  ground.  The  club,  naturally  under  the 
circumstances,  was  crammed.  Men  sat  at 
every  table,  reading  papers,  writing  letters, 
playing  draughts  and  dominoes.  They  stood 
about  with  cups  of  tea  and  cocoa  in  their 
hands.  They  crowded  round  the  fires.  The 
steam  of  wet  clothes  and  thick  clouds  of 
tobacco  smoke  filled  the  air  and  dimmed  the 
light  from  lamps,  feeble  at  best,  which  hung 
from  ceiling  and  wall. 

In  one  corner  a  man  sat  on  a  rickety 
chair.  His  back  was  turned  to  the  room. 
He  faced  the  two  walls  of  his  corner.  The 
position  struck  me  as  odd  until  I  noticed 


292  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

that  he  sat  that  way  in  order  to  get  a  little 
light  on  the  pages  of  the  book  he  read.  It 
was  Oscar  Wilde's  De  Profundis.  It  was, 
I  suppose,  part  of  my  business  to  make 
friends  of  the  men  round  me.  I  managed 
with  some  difficulty  to  get  into  conversation 
with  that  man.  He  turned  his  chair  half 
round  and,  starting  from  Oscar  Wilde,  gave 
me  his  views  on  prison  life.  The  private 
soldier,  coming  under  military  discipline, 
is  a  prisoner,  so  this  man  thought.  He  did 
not  deny  that  it  may  be  worth  while  to  go 
to  prison  for  a  good  cause.  But  prison 
life  is  as  galling  and  abominable  for  a  martyr 
as  for  a  criminal. 

There  is  a  stir  among  the  men.  A  lady, 
heavily  cloaked  and  waterproofed,  made  a 
slow  progress  through  the  room,  staring 
round  her  with  curious  eyes.  She  was  a 
stranger,  evidently  a  distinguished  stranger, 
for  she  was  escorted  by  a  colonel  and  two 
other  officers.  My  friend  nodded  towards 
her. 

"  Do  you  know  her  ?  "    he  asked. 

I  shook  my  head.  He  named  a  very 
eminent  novelist. 

"  Doing  a  tour  of  the  Expeditionary  Force, 
I  expect,"  he  said.  "  I  used  to  review  her 
books  before  the  war.  I'd  rather  like  to 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  293 

review  the  one  she'll  write  about  this. 
Once"— he  added  this  reminiscence  after  a 
pause — "  I  dined  in  her  company  in 
London." 

He  was  a  journalist  before  he  enlisted. 
If  he  survives  he  will  no  doubt  write  a  book, 
a  new  De  Profundis,  and  it  ought  to  be  worth 
reading. 

I  went  one  afternoon  to  a  railway  station 
to  say  good-bye  to  some  friends  of  mine 
who  were  off  to  the  firing-line.  Troops 
usually  left  the  base  where  I  was  then 
stationed  at  10  or  11  o'clock  at  night 
and  we  did  not  go  to  see  them  off.  This 
party — they  were  Canadians — started  in  the 
afternoon  and  from  an  unusual  station. 
The  scene  was  familiar  enough.  There  was 
a  long  train,  for  the  most  part  goods  waggons. 
There  were  hundreds  of  laughing  men,  and 
a  buffet  where  ladies — those  ladies  who 
somehow  never  fail — gave  tea  and  cocoa  to 
waiting  crowds.  Sergeants  served  out 
rations  for  the  journey.  Officers  struggled 
to  get  their  kit  into  compartments  already 
overfull. 

I  made  my  way  slowly  along  the  platform, 
looking  for  my  friends.  In  halting  European 
French  I  answered  inquiries  made  of  me  in 
fluent  Canadian  French  by  a  soldier  of 


294  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

Quebec.  I  came  on  a  man  who  must  have 
been  a  full-blooded  Indian  standing  by 
himself,  staring  straight  in  front  of  him 
with  wholly  emotionless  eyes.  On  every 
side  of  me  I  heard  the  curious  Canadian 
intonation  of  English  speech. 

I  found  my  friends  at  last.  They  were 
settling  down  with  others  whom  I  did  not 
know  into  a  waggon  labelled  "  Chevaux, 
8  ;  Hommes,  40."  I  do  not  know  how  eight 
horses  would  have  liked  a  two-days 
journey  in  that  waggon.  The  forty  men 
were  cheerfully  determined  to  make  the 
best  of  things.  I  condoled  and  sympa- 
thised. 

From  a  far  corner  of  the  waggon  came  a 
voice  quoting  a  line  of  Virgil.  "  Forsitan  et 
illis  olim  meminisse  juvabit."  It  is  a  common 
tag,  of  course,  but  I  did  not  expect  to  hear 
it  then  and  there.  The  speaker  was  a  boy, 
smooth-faced,  gentle-looking.  In  what 
school  of  what  remote  province  did  he  learn 
to  construe  and  repeats  bits  of  the  JEneid  ? 
With  the  French-Canadians,  the  Indian,  and 
all  the  rest  of  them,  he,  with  his  pathetic 
little  scrap  of  Latin,  was  a  private  in  the 
army  of  the  empire. 

It  was  my  exceptional  good  fortune  to  be 
stationed  for  many  months  in  a  large  con- 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  295 

valescent  camp.  I  might  have  been  attached 
to  a  brigade,  in  which  case  I  should  have 
known  perhaps  Irish,  or  Scots,  or  men  from 
some  one  or  two  parts  of  England ;  but 
them  only.  That  camp  in  which  I  worked 
received  men  from  every  branch  of  the 
service  and  from  every  corner  of  the  empire. 
A  knowledge  of  the  cap  badges  to  be  seen 
any  day  in  that  camp  would  have  required 
long  study  and  a  good  memory.  From  the 
ubiquitous  gun  of  the  artillery  to  the  FIJI 
of  a  South  Sea  Island  contingent  we  had 
them  all  at  one  time  or  another. 

And  the  variety  of  speech  and  accent 
was  as  great  as  the  variety  of  cap  badges. 
It  was  difficult  to  believe — I  should  not  have 
believed  beforehand — that  the  English  lan- 
guage could  be  spoken  in  so  many  different 
ways.  But  it  was  the  men  themselves,  more 
than  their  varied  speech  and  far-separated 
homes,  who  made  me  feel  how  widely  the 
net  of  service  has  swept  through  society 
and  how  many  different  kinds  of  men  are 
fighting  in  the  army. 

I  happened  one  day  to  fall  into  convex 
sation  with  a  private,  a  young  man  in  very 
worn  and  even  tattered  clothes.  He  had 
been  "  up  against  it "  somewhere  on  the 
Somme  front,  and  had  not  yet  been  served 


296  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

out  with  fresh  kit.  The  mud  of  the  ground 
over  which  he  had  been  fighting  was  thickly 
caked  on  most  parts  of  his  clothing,  and  he 
was  endeavouring  to  scrape  it  off  with  the 
blade  of  a  penknife.  He  smiled  at  me  in 
a  particularly  friendly  way  when  I  greeted 
him,  and  we  dropped  into  a  conversation 
which  lasted  for  quite  a  long  time.  He 
showed  me,  rather  shyly,  a  pocket  edition 
of  Herodotus  which  he  had  carried  about  in 
his  pocket  and  had  read  at  intervals  during 
the  time  he  was  fighting  on  the  Somme. 

A  private  who  quotes  Latin  in  the  waggon 
of  a  troop  train.  A  battered  soldier  who 
reads  Greek  for  his  own  pleasure  in  the 
trenches,  is  more  surprising  still.  The  Baron 
Bradwardwine  took  Livy  into  battle  with 
him.  But  there  must  be  ten  men  who  can 
read  Livy  for  every  one  who  can  tackle 
Herodotus  without  a  dictionary. 

A  piano  is  an  essential  part  of  the  equip- 
ment of  a  recreation  hut  in  France.  The 
soldier  loves  to  make  music,  and  it  is  sur- 
prising how  many  soldiers  can  make  music 
of  a  sort.  Pity  is  wasted  on  inanimate 
things.  Otherwise  one's  heart's  sympathy 
would  go  out  to  those  pianos.  It  would  be 
a  dreadful  thing  for  an  instrument  of  feeling 
to  have  "  Irish  Eyes,"  "  The  Only  Girl  in 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  297 

the  World,"  and  "  Home  Fires,"  played  on 
it  every  day  and  all  day  long.  I  am  not,  I 
am  often  thankful  for  it,  acutely  musical. 
But  there  have  been  times  in  Y.M.C.A.  huts 
when  I  felt  I  should  shriek  if  I  heard  the  tune 
of  "  Home  Fires  "  again. 

I  was  playing  chess  one  afternoon  with  a 
man  who  was  beating  me.  I  became  so  much 
absorbed  in  the  game  that  I  actually  ceased 
to  hear  the  piano.  Then,  after  a  while  I 
heard  it  again,  played  in  quite  an  unusual 
manner.  The  player  had  got  beyond  "  Irish 
Eyes "  and  the  rest  of  those  tunes.  He 
was  playing,  with  the  tenderest  feeling,  one 
of  Chopin's  Nocturnes.  He  asked  me  after- 
wards if  I  could  by  any  means  borrow  for 
him  a  volume  of  Beethoven,  one  which 
contained  the  "  Waldstein  "  if  possible.  He 
confessed  that  he  could  not  play  the  "  Wald- 
stein "  without  the  score.  He  was  an 
elderly  man,  elderly  compared  to  most  of 
those  round  him.  He  was  in  the  R.E.,  a 
sapper.  There  must  be  scores  of  musicians 
of  taste  and  culture  in  the  army.  I  wonder 
if  there  was  another  employed  in  laying  out 
roads  behind  the  Somme  front. 

I  gained  a  reputation,  wholly  undeserved, 
as  a  chess  player  while  I  was  in  that  camp, 
and  I  was  generally  able  to  put  up  some 


-298  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

sort  of  fight  against  my  opponents  even  if 
they  beat  me  in  the  end. 

But  I  was  utterly  defeated  by  one  man,  a 
Russian.  He  could  speak  no  English  and 
very  little  French.  He  belonged  to  a  Can- 
adian regiment,  but  how  he  got  into  it  or 
managed  to  live  with  his  comrades  I  do  not 
know.  He  and  I  communicated  with  each 
other  only  by  moving  the  pieces  on  the  chess 
board.  I  suppose  he  was  a  member  of  the 
Russian  Church,  but  on  Sundays  he  attended 
the  services  which  I  conducted.  He  used  to 
isit  as  near  me  as  he  could  and  I  always  found 
his  places  for  him.  He  could  not  read 
English  any  more  than  he  could  speak  it, 
so  the  Prayer  Book  cannot  have  been  much 
use  to  him.  But  there  was  no  priest  of  his 
own  church  anywhere  within  reach,  and  he 
was  evidently  a  religious  man.  I  suppose 
he  found  the  Church  of  England  service 
better  than  none  at  all. 

There  was  always  one  difficulty  about  the 
Church  of  England  services  in  that  camp. 
We  had  to  trust  to  chance  for  a  pianist  who 
could  play  chants,  responses,  and  hymns, 
and  for  a  choir  who  could  sing  them.  The 
choir  difficulty  was  not  serious.  It  was 
nearly  always  possible  to  get  twenty  volun- 
teers who  had  sung  in  church  choirs  at  home. 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  299 

But  a  pianist  who  was  familiar  with  church 
music  was  a  rare  person  to  find.  When 
found  he  had  a  way,  very  annoying  to  me, 
of  getting  well  quickly  and  going  back  to 
his  regiment. 

I  was  let  down  rather  badly  once  or  twice 
by  men  who  were  anxious  to  play  for  the 
service,  but  turned  out  to  be  capable  of  no 
more  than  three  or  four  hymns,  played  by 
ear,  sometimes  in  impossible  keys.  I  became 
cautious  and  used  to  question  volunteers 
carefully  beforehand.  One  man  who  offered 
himself  seemed  particularly  diffident  and 
doubtful  about  his  ability  to  play  what  I 
wanted.  I  asked  him  at  last  whether  he 
had  ever  played  any  instrument,  organ  or 
harmonium,  at  a  Church  of  England  service. 

"  Oh  yes,  sir,  often,"  he  said.  "  Before 
the  war  I  was  assistant  organist  at  -  — ." 

He  named  a  great  English  cathedral,  one 
justly  famous  for  its  music.  The  next 
Sunday  and  for  several  Sundays  afterwards 
our  music  was  a  joy.  My  friend  was  one  of 
those  rare  people  who  play  in  such  a  way 
that  every  one  present  feels  compelled  to 
sing. 

Looking  back  over  the  time  I  spent  in 
France,  it  seems  as  if  a  long  procession  of 
interesting  and  splendid  men  passed  by  me. 


300  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

They  came  from  every  rank  of  society,  from 
many  processions  and  trades. 

There  were  rich  men  among  them,  a  few, 
and  very  many  poor  men.  I  have  witnessed 
the  signature  of  a  private  in  a  north  of 
England  regiment  to  papers  concerned  with 
the  transfer  of  several  thousand  pounds  from 
one  security  to  another.  I  have  helped  to 
cash  cheques  for  men  with  large  bank 
balances.  I  have  bought  crumpled  and  very 
dirty  penny  stamps  from  men  who  otherwise 
would  not  have  been  able  to  pay  for  the 
cup  of  cocoa  or  the  bun  they  wanted. 

There  were  men  in  trouble  who  came  to  me 
with  letters  in  their  hands  containing  news 
from  home  which  brought  tears  to  their  eyes 
and  mine.  There  were  men — wonderfully  few 
of  them — with  grievances,  genuine  enough 
very  often,  but  impossible  to  remove. 

There  were  men  with  all  sorts  of  religious 
difficulties,  with  simple  questions  on  their 
lips  about  the  problems  which  most  of  us 
have  given  up  as  insoluble  on  this  side  of 
the  grave.  We  met.  There  was  a  swiftly 
formed  friendship,  a  brief  intimacy,  and 
then  they  passed  from  that  camp,  their 
temporary  resting-place,  and  were  caught 
again  into  the  intricate  working  of  the  vast 
machine  of  war. 


CITIZEN   SOLDIERS  301 

We  were  "  ships  that  pass  in  the  night 
and  speak  one  another  in  passing."  The 
quotation  is  hackneyed  almost  beyond  en- 
during, but  it  is  impossible  to  express  the 
feeling  better.  Efforts  to  carry  on  a  corre- 
spondence afterwards  generally  ended  in 
failure.  A  letter  or  two  was  written.  Then 
new  friends  were  made  and  new  interests 
arose.  It  became  impossible  to  write,  be- 
cause— oddest  of  reasons — after  a  time  there 
was  nothing  to  say.  The  old  common  in- 
terests had  vanished. 

From  time  to  time  we  who  remained  in  a 
camp — workers  there — got  news  of  one  friend 
or  another,  heard  that  some  boy  we  knew 
had  won  distinction  for  his  gallantry.  Then 
we  rejoiced.  Or,  far  oftener,  we  found  a 
well-known  name  in  the  casualty  lists,  and 
we  sorrowed. 

Sometimes  our  friends  came  back  to  us, 
wounded  afresh  or  ground  down  again  to 
sickness  by  the  pitiless  machine.  They 
emerged  from  the  fog  which  surrounded  for 
us  the  mysterious  and  awful  "  Front,"  and 
we  welcomed  them.  But  they  told  us  very 
little.  The  soldier,  whatever  his  position 
or  education  was  in  civil  life,  is  strangely 
inarticulate.  He  will  speak  in  general  terms 
of  "  stunts "  and  scraps,  of  being  "  up 


302  CITIZEN   SOLDIERS 

against  it,"  and  of  "  carrying  on  "  ;  but  of 
the  living  details  of  life  in  the  trenches  or  on 
the  battle-field  he  has  little  to  say.  Still 
less  will  he  speak  of  feelings,  emotions,  hopes, 
and  fears.  I  suppose  that  life  in  the  midst 
of  visible  death  is  too  awful  a  thing  to  talk 
of  and  that  there  is  no  language  in  which 
to  express  the  terrific  waves  of  fear,  horror, 
hope,  and  exaltation. 

Perhaps  we  may  find  in  the  very  mon- 
strousness  of  this  war  an  explanation  of  the 
soldier's  unceasing  effort  to  treat  the  whole 
business  as  a  joke,  to  laugh  at  the  very 
worst  that  can  befall  him.  With  men  of 
other  nations  it  is  different  no  doubt.  The 
French  fight  gloriously  and  seem  to  live  in  a 
high,  heroic  mood.  The  men  of  our  empire, 
of  all  parts  of  it,  jest  in  the  presence  of  terror, 
perhaps  because  the  alternative  to  jesting 
is  either  fear  or  tears.  Others  may  mis- 
understand us.  Often  we  do  not  understand 
ourselves.  It  is  not  easy  to  think  of  Sam 
Weller  or  Mark  Tapley  as  the  hero  of  a 
stricken  field.  Yet  it  is  by  men  with  Sam 
Weller 's  quaint  turn  of  wit  and  Mark 
Tapley's  unfailing  cheerfulness  that  the  great 
battles  in  France  and  Belgium  are  being 
won. 


Bade — "  A  Padre  in  France." 


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